Mitigation

Cap and trade and Clean Development Mechanism

 * Element Description:** Mitigation is one of the two central approaches to climate change and involves human intervention to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.“The ultimate objective of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is to stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases at a level that will prevent dangerous interference with the climate system” (UNFCCC’s GHG Data Report 2008).There are various proposals of how to decrease GHGs, but the central question is how to make mitigation “measureable, reportable, and verifiable.”Three major strategies to mitigate, or alleviate, greenhouse gases are a cap and trade system, the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), and technology.

The ultimate objective of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is to stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases at a level that will prevent dangerous interference with the climate system.


 * Concentration level before industrial revolution || 278 ppm ||
 * Concentration level 1990 || 350 ppm ||
 * Concentration level (latest) || 387 ppm ||

**MITIGATION STRATEGIES**

** Cap and Trade **
 * Element Description: **Allowance emissions trading system that harnesses the incentives of the free market to reduce pollution.Its goal is to steadily reduce greenhouse gas emissions economy-wide in a cost-effective manner.


 * 1) **//Cap//**: limit on amount of pollution that can emitted
 * 2) **//Allowance//**: authorization to emit a fixed amount
 * 3) **//Reduction//**: options of how to reduce emissions
 * 4) **//Allowance//** **//trading//**: buy/sell allowances in open market
 * 5) **//Compliance//**: own as many allowances as emissions


 * Stakeholders: **The European Union and Australia are already using emissions trading to meet Kyoto targets, and many U.S. states and Canadian provinces have begun regional trading schemes.Other stakeholders include large-scale emitter companies and industries.It is cheaper or easier for some companies to reduce their emissions below their required limit than others, so the more efficient companies, who emit less than their allowance, can sell their extra permits to companies that are not able to make reductions as easily.This creates a system that guarantees a set level of overall reductions, while rewarding the most efficient companies and ensuring that the cap can be met at be lowest possible cost to the economy.

• **STRONG ENVIRONMENTALLY** – Strict limits à pollution reduction – Significant, widespread, and guaranteed human health and environmental benefits
 * Key Issues: **
 * Components of a good cap and trade system:**

• **STRONG POLITICALLY** – High compliance, transparency, and accountability – Compatibility with state and local programs • **STRONG ECONOMICALLY** – Regulatory certainty and flexibility for sources – Incentives for early pollution reduction and innovations in control technologies • **SENDS MESSAGE** – It **“PAYS TO CHANGE,”** rather than you can **“GET AWAY WITHOUT CHANGING”**

• **Pay to //not// //reduce//** emissions – Groups that do not pollute sell their conservation to the highest bidder, who pays //not// to reduce • **Pay //to// //emit//** emissions – No net reduction in emissions à more polluting allowed – If too many emission credits issued, more allowances than carbon (the effectiveness of regulation is diluted, e.g. European Union Emission Trading Scheme) • **//Can’t pay//** to reduce or emit – Still too expensive to change and reduce
 * Criticisms of a bad cap and trade system:**

** [|Clean Development Mechanism] **
 * Element Description: **Clean development mechanism is a major policy component of the Kyoto Protocol.Wealthy nations can meet their emissions reduction targets by funding GHG mitigation projects and sustainable development projects in non-Annex I Parties to reduce emissions in developing countries, where mitigation costs are lower.


 * Stakeholders: **Non-Annex I parties (developing countries) are at stake, and some argue that the wealthy nations that initiate projects in developing countries are just trying to avoid responsibility for lowering their own emissions.The wealthier nations are interested in meeting the Kyoto Treaty emissions reduction targets, and the developing nations are interested in supporting their people and building more sustainable infrastructures.Many developing countries are taking mitigation action, including the scaling up of renewables in energy generation or energy efficiency targets.


 * Key Issues: **The stakeholders in CDM are the Non-Annex I parties (developing countries), and some argue that the wealthy nations that initiate projects in developing countries are just trying to avoid responsibility for lowering their own emissions.It is also argued that the projects do not ensure “real, measureable and verifiable emission reductions that are additional to what would have occurred without the project,” but instead that many CDM projects would have occurred without the funding.