Cap and Trade
We now have a new president. President Elect Obama promised many things during his campaign. So many promises that he can never keep them all. One promise he has made, I think, he will eventually put into effect, and that are the Cap and Trade policies.
Cap and Trade is basically setting a limit on the amount of carbon a company can output. Those of you that believe in global warming will applaud this cap. Well things get a little complicated after that, okay a lot complicated.
Lets say company A makes car tires, which I am assuming, releases a lot of carbon during the manufacturing process. We have company B that produces handmade wicker baskets. Since those baskets are all handmade the company basically has zero carbon emission.
The carbon emission levels are set so low that Company A can never meet them. The only way they can stay in business is to buy carbon credits from Company B. In effect you, the consumer, is going to be paying more for tires, while you will be getting wicker baskets at a steal. Tell me, which do you need the most?
Obama said: “If somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It’s just that it will bankrupt them,” and electricity rates will “necessarily skyrocket”
It isn’t as cut and dry as stated above. Company B will never have an emissions cap as high as Company A. No, all things aren’t created equally. Still I think that Company B will have a better chance at meeting the cap than Company A.
Why complicate matters? If you want to cap carbon emissions, why not just set a limit? Would that be too easy? I can see a lot of money being made from something you can’t even see. Instead of investing for retirement in the stock market, you might invest in the carbon cap market. People will be opening business that can easily command extra carbon credits and sell them on this market. The more there is a demand, the higher the prices.
This is just one more thing that is going to raise the cost of goods for the consumer. The price of corn will go up all in the name of global warming. Wait, hasn’t the price of corn already gone up in the name of global warming? The demand for ethanol, for some time, caused the price of corn to skyrocket. The same thing will happen with any product that produces large amounts of carbon in its production. Cap and Trade will do for company A, what the unions have done for the American automakers.
All this, when each day there are fewer and fewer people and scientists that believe in anthropogenic global warming. On top of this, I am sure we will see lots of government fines for companies not buying enough carbon credits. This, also, doesn’t guarantee the carbon tax idea will go away. In fact, I am positive that during the democratic reign we will see some type of carbon tax.
Below comes from ABC News’ Jake Tapper, as taken from a January 2008 interview Sen. Obama gave to the San Francisco Chronicle.
| “I voted against the Clear Skies Bill. In fact, I was the deciding vote — despite the fact that I’m a coal state and that half my state thought that I had thoroughly betrayed them. Because I think clean air is critical and global warming is critical. “But this notion of no coal, I think, is an illusion. Because the fact of the matter is, is that right now we are getting a lot of our energy from coal. And China is building a coal-powered plant once a week. So what we have to do then is figure out how can we use coal without emitting greenhouse gases and carbon. And how can we sequester that carbon and capture it. If we can’t, then we’re gonna still be working on alternatives.”But … let me sort of describe my overall policy. What I’ve said is that we would put a cap and trade policy in place that is as aggressive if not more aggressive than anyone out there. I was the first call for 100 percent auction on the cap and trade system. Which means that every unit of carbon or greenhouse gases that was emitted would be charged to the polluter. That will create a market in which whatever technologies are out there that are being presented, whatever power plants are being built, they would have to meet the rigors of that market and the ratcheted-down caps that are imposed every year.
“So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It’s just that it will bankrupt them because they’re going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted. That will also generate billions of dollars that we can invest in solar, wind, biodiesel, and other alternative energy approaches. The only thing that I’ve said with respect to coal - I haven’t been some coal booster. What I have said is that for us to take coal off the table as an ideological matter, as opposed to saying if technology allows us to use coal in a clean way, we should pursue it, that I think is the right approach. The same with respect to nuclear. Right now, we don’t know how to store nuclear waste wisely and we don’t know how to deal with some of the safety issues that remain. And so it’s wildly expensive to pursue nuclear energy. But I tell you what, if we could figure out how to store it safely, then I think most of us would say that might be a pretty good deal. “The point is, if we set rigorous standards for the allowable emissions, then we can allow the market to determine and technology and entrepreneurs to pursue, what the best approach is to take, as opposed to us saying at the outset, here are the winners that we’re picking and maybe we pick wrong and maybe we pick right.” |
Source: Wikipedia, Townhall.com
Popularity: 82% [?]
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