The cap and trade boat just got a little fuller

Oh what a relief it biz

Posted by Kif Scheuer (Guest Contributor) at 2:53 PM on 08 May 2007

The United States Climate Action Partnership, the group of corporations calling "on the federal government to quickly enact strong national legislation to require significant reductions of greenhouse gas emissions," just doubled in size (PDF):

With its new members, USCAP companies now have total revenues of $1.7 trillion, a collective workforce of more than 2 million and operations in all 50 states; they also have a combine market capitalization of more than $1.9 trillion.

The big news is that General Motors has joined the list:

GM is very pleased to join USCAP to proactively address the concerns posed by climate change and applauds its members for recognizing the important role that technology can play in achieving an economy-wide solution," said Rick Wagoner, chairman and CEO of General Motors. "A central element as we see it is energy diversity -- being able to offer consumers vehicles that can be powered by many different energy sources and advanced propulsion systems to help displace petroleum and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Other new members include Alcan, Boston Scientific, ConocoPhillips, Deere & Company, The Dow Chemical Company, Johnson & Johnson, Marsh, PepsiCo, Shell, and Siemens, along with The Nature Conservancy and the National Wildlife Federation.

For story: The cap and trade boat just got a little fuller
8 Comments | Post a Comment

Dow, Dupont and GM....

Working together to clean up carbon emissions. Yeah, that's a sure winner.

What is USCAP's position on energy generated by coal?
Coal supplies over fifty percent of our current electricity generation and will play a continuing role in our energy future. The policies we support encourage the development and deployment of carbon capture and storage and other advanced coal technologies. We believe the construction of new plants should occur in a manner that will allow them to capture and store CO2 when the conditions exist to support its implementation. We do not take a position as a group on any specific project, even though as individual organizations many USCAP Members do have such positions. (emphasis mine)

In short just keep on polluting. In fact implement that extra polluting as long as you pretend you'll fix it someday. Remember when California was going to get some Zero Emissions Vehicles made by big three automakers? Don't see to many of those driving around do you.

I smell greenwash. I sure hope all those nice old folks in Florida can tread water.

Put the Carbon Back

by Pangolin at 4:23 PM on 08 May 2007

Cap, ALLOCATE & Trade

The worth of this approach depends, centrally, of the chosen structure of the Allocation of emission rights.

Could people please help to get this perspective over by using the title above when writing about it ?

Regards,

Bill

by Billhook at 1:12 AM on 09 May 2007

specific reduction target

I agree we need to watch how policies are implemented. But the bottom line is, these companies have committed to a specific and mandatory national emissions cap. How could that be anything but good?

Why are they doing it? They see the opportunity that comes with new technology (as do legions of venture capitalists). Plus a national cap is a easier to comply with than 50 different laws in 50 different states.

Sheryl Canter
Environmental Defense

by scanter at 11:10 AM on 10 May 2007

The bigger they are, the more windage . . . . .

Sheryl,

I'd fully agree with the motives you ascribe to these companies, and add a couple more possibilities.

These are:

1/. a lack of confidence in the efficacy of the Carbon Tax option,
given both corporations' long expertise in avoiding taxes
and the limited and tardy influence of such a tax on peoples' options, let alone their choices, and

2/. a recognition that big business is itself utterly vulnerable to the sort of disruption & loss that Climate Destabilization has begun to impose,
and so it must lobby for a binding global cap & decline of emissions ASAP,
for which a national system of Cap, Allocate & Trade is a logical sarting point.

Regards,

Billhook

by Billhook at 11:51 AM on 10 May 2007
[ Parent ]

Plus let's not forget

the comment regarding the partnership that I found of interest in the NY Times article about the partnership.

Timing also played a role in the executives' thinking. As Mr. Darbee [chief executive of PG&E] said, ''We have the opportunity to construct something more pragmatic and realistic while President Bush is in office.'' A future political climate, after 2008, he said, might produce ''solutions less sensitive to the needs of business.''

http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F ...

Unfortunately, I'm pretty cynical about the integrity and judgement of the two leading enviros involved in the partnership, Natural Resources Defense Council and Environmental Defense (Fund), and thus have reservations about this partnership, beyond my general concerns about the "carbon-trading" approach to addressing global warming.

bernardo issel - http://www.NonprofitWatch.org - bernardo (at) NonprofitWatch.org

by NonprofitWatch at 1:15 PM on 10 May 2007

win-win solutions work best

What's most important is that climate legislation accomplish what needs to accomplished, and the US-CAP Call for Action does this. US-CAP advocates national legislation for a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (see http://www.us-cap.org/).

It's good for businesses to be able to meet emissions targets while keeping their businesses strong. A crippled economy is bad for everybody, and no one would cooperate if that was the price.

Sheryl Canter
Environmental Defense

by scanter at 2:32 PM on 10 May 2007
[ Parent ]

USCAP gives GM a freebie?

With emphasis being on cap & trade, will GM be given credit for all its E85 vehicles, even though few actually are run on E85 and even though US ethanol, being corn-based, isn't really green?

by lloydmorris at 6:53 PM on 11 May 2007

Where are my payments?

Hey, all:

As one who has been off the grid and using sustainable energy for 9 years, I have only recently really become familiar with the Carbon offsets and the fact that people and corporations pay others for Carbon credits. So is my check in the mail? Or is the middleman in this transaction actually in the end, the destination?

'Uh, yeah, you get a cut, sure, but my overhead, commission, expenses, license and fees just really kinda eats up any payments, so there really isn't any point in sending a check for nothing.'

Or this:

'Oh, of course, we are all about the little guy. Anyone who produces as little as 200,000 kiloWatt-hours qualifies for the program.' 'Oh, you produce 4500 Watt-hours? Is this a prank call? Are you trying to punk me? You young whipper snappers! SSholes!'

What a stinking joke. Yeah I smell greenwash, and it smells just like bullshit. Just like it.

David
Sustainability For Life

Messages done with sustainable energy, with Wind and Sun!

by SustainableGreen at 11:25 PM on 11 May 2007

ADVERTISING POLICY

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