This has been circulating on the envlawprofs listserve and drawn some pretty harsh criticism. I've pasted some of the back-and-forth below (which I also shared with my students).
-js ____________________ Dear colleagues, Here is one view on the "trade" part of "cap and trade." Click on the link. Perhaps someone on the list will explain what's wrong with Annie Leonard's analysis. (By the way, the Government of Ukraine refuses to disclose documents showing what it is going to do with the billions of dollars to be received from Japan to offset Japan's failure to reduce emissions. My colleagues in Ukraine are filing lawsuits to obtain the documents.) Thanks, John Bonine ____________________ There's so much wrong with it, one would be hard pressed to respond to it all. And what's not wrong is misleading. An example of misleading is the fact that at the end in small type is the fact that "carbon fees," which are never mentioned orally by Ms. Leonard that I heard, apparently become the means to achieve a cap. Repeating over and again that Bernie Madoff and Goldman Sachs are behind cap-and-trade, but hiding that instead she is suggesting carbon taxes is somewhere between dishonest and dissembling. Carbon taxes, or fees if you are afraid of the "t" word, have certain theoretical advantages, but they also have certain disadvantages, and that's not even counting the fact that carbon taxes, whatever their theoretical advantages, are DOA. Ms. Leonard's revelation that the existing Clean Air Act provides all the authority we need (but I can't see where the carbon fees come from under the CAA) is ludicrous. I repeat, just what we need, environmentalists opposing cap-and-trade. Cap-and-trade may not be ideal, and the cap-and-trade bills possible of passage may be only slightly better than terrible, but they are the only game in town, and cartoons won't change that for the better. Bill Funk __________________ So Bill, apart from the errors in the video, am I to take it that you think that the trade part of cap-and-trade is going to work across borders and between continents, and in "selling" countries with weak governance and rampant corruption? If so, Japan's purchase of mythical reductions or benefits in Ukraine will be a win-win for the planet. If not, Japan gets off the hook and fails to reduce its emissions as much as needed. John Bonine ____________________ Dear John, Entertaining, a lot of fast talk, and some good points, but some red herrings too. Cap and trade was NOT designed by Enron and Wall Street, though both use/misuse it. It's fun to have Monopoly-type figures running around with $ on their clothes, but cap and trade is not a get-rich-quick scheme with nothing behind it. It's a serious strategy with lots of economics behind it, and it can work and has worked if designed properly. If some brokers make money on the side, so be it. There's a comprehensive recent assessment of cap and trade systems in the US by Dan Burtraw and colleague at RFF that shows it's been effective, in part by stimulating cost-reducing innovation even by parties not directly in the system. It also shows that the acid rain program would have captured more benefits if Congress had tightened the cap, but that's another story. The GIVEAWAY is not such a terrible idea as Annie suggests. Most serious economic analysts say that in the end giving away the rights has the same effect on prices and business strategy as the auction approach. I'd prefer the auction, too, as would most economists, especially for its government revenue potential, but the giveaway is not a scam and it's not the end of the world, just a second-best approach. Again, see the acid rain program. Her claim that cap-and-trade didn't work in Europe is a canard. The EU commission made a big mistake at the start by setting their cap too high, causing some of the market instability that Annie describes, but they tightened the cap and the system has been working more smoothly for quite a while. And don't believe her suggestion that cap and trade has anything to do with fuel prices at the pump. We could learn a thing or two from the Europeans on this point, as I think Annie would agree. Gasoline here in Denmark is around $2 per liter, or well over $8 a gallon. Their petroleum costs what ours does; the difference is taxes. Personally, I favor much higher prices at the pump as a good climate policy, but Annie would lose her US audience if she made that pitch. Cheating: Yes, it's an issue, a big issue, but that's true of any system where so much money is at stake. Direct regulation is not necessarily the better approach, as we saw with the recent stories about non-enforcement of the CWA. As Annie argues, the devil is in the details (isn't it always?), but that doesn't mean the system is flawed in principle, just that it will need a lot of bells and whistles and good monitoring and enforcement to try to assure real emission reductions. And transparency, too--your Ukraine story shows the problem. Is cap and trade a distraction? I don't buy that argument. If developing countries (at least the major emitters) won't buy the cap, then the game is up anyway. So what are we arguing about? The cap is the central idea; the trade part is just a way to create some flexibility and private choice and innovation incentive in how emitting sources meet the cap. Will cap and trade allow the coal companies to stay in business? I suppose so--but this is not about punishing the bad guys. We can't simply shut down every coal-fired power plant tomorrow. In the longer run, under cap and trade the carbon price will go up, and coal will have to become a very innovative, lower-carbon industry to keep it's market. In the end, what coal offers is carbon to burn, so unless they can find ways sequester all that carbon after combustion they will get squeezed out of the market. A final thought: If we all went with Annie's plea (and my heart is with her), we would be writing our Senators and Congress people to tell them to kill cap-and-trade. My mind says that's not a good idea. We've had too much temporizing in Washington already. A full-scale political attack on cap-and-trade from the left will just prolong the political deadlock at the national level. That will leave us with what we have now, a patchwork of state and local initiatives--good, but not good enough to match the scale of the problem and it would leave us on the sidelines internationally. --Sandy Gaines <>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<> Professor Jim Salzman Duke Law School Nicholas School of Environment and Earth Sciences Box 90360 Durham NC 27708 USA office (1)919.613.7185 fax (1) 919.613.7231 <>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<> >>> Matthew Paterson <[email protected]> 12/2/2009 11:04 AM >>> Hi all A great animation on cap and trade, would be perfect for teaching purposes. Cheers Mat -- Matthew Paterson École d'études politiques, Université d'Ottawa Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5 tel: +1 613 562-5800 x1716 Web site: http://www.socialsciences.uottawa.ca/pol/eng/profdetails.asp?ID=123 And http://matpaterson.wordpress.com/ Co-editor, Global Environmental Politics: http://www.mitpressjournals.org/loi/glep Latest books "Climate capitalism: global warming and the transformation of the global economy" (with Peter Newell) http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=0521194857 And "Cultural Political Economy" (edited, with Jacqueline Best) http://www.routledgepolitics.com/books/Cultural-Political-Economy-isbn978041 5489324 > ------ Forwarded Message > From: Julian Rodríguez-Drix <[email protected]> > Date: Wed, 2 Dec 2009 10:49:18 -0500 > To: <[email protected]> > Subject: [Nocarbontrade-l] animation: cap-n-trade crique (story of stuff) > > http://storyofstuff.com/capandtrade/ > > a critique of cap-and-trade from the woman who made the story of stuff > animation (http://www.storyofstuff.com/) > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Nocarbontrade-l mailing list > Info and options: > http://mailman-new.greennet.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/nocarbontrade-l > To unsubscribe, email [email protected] ------ End of Forwarded Message
