California Carbon Market To Generate Billions But Won't End Budget Woes

As Californians grapple with further draconian cuts to education and social services as the deficit soars – again – to $16 billion, a budgetary bright spot has appeared on the horizon: the billions of dollars in revenues that will be generated once a state carbon market launches later this year.  Beginning in November, California’s biggest emitters of greenhouse gases must begin to purchase pollution allowances at an auction under the state’s cap-and-trade market if they do not meet emission limits. The mandate is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in California to 1990 levels by 2020.

31 Percent Anti-Dumping Tariffs Announced For Chinese Solar Panels

The U.S. Department of Commerce on Thursday announced stiff anti-dumping tariffs of around 31 percent on crystalline silicon solar panels imported from China, leading to a new round of concerns on how the duties will impact the growing American solar industry.

Apple Data Center Will Be Totally Green by 2013

Apple Inc. (AAPL), targeted by Greenpeace International over its energy consumption, said its 500,000- square-foot data center in Maiden, North Carolina, will be powered entirely by renewable sources by the end of the year.  The move, announced today on Apple’s website, follows protests at the company’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, and elsewhere.

Are airline carbon levy wars a sign of things to come?

The European Union (EU) has unilaterally declared that it wants all planes entering or leaving the EU territory to pay an emissions tax. The bloc has long had an emissions trading scheme (ETS) that is applicable to large emitters like power stations, smelters and refineries, but aviation is something new.  The principle of making polluters pay is a sound one. There is good theory and evidence to demonstrate how externalities are borne by third parties and that which is not paid for, in the end, amounts to a subsidy to industry. For instance, the US Environmental Protection Agency has declared carbon dioxide (CO2) a pollutant and is pushing through regulations under the Clean Air Act for all new coal-fired power plants to have a cap on their greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions.  The EU aviation ETS is the only mandatory scheme in the world at present.

Latest Carbon News Headlines

Point Carbon's OTC price assessments

		Close	+/-
EUA	Dec 2012	6.61	0.11
sCER	Dec 2012	3.60	-0.07

 

 

 

Point Carbon News Latest news

Policy

17 May 2012 18:50

CORRECTION: U.N. launches “historic” Durban platform talks

BONN, May 17 (Reuters Point Carbon) - The U. N. on Thursday launched a new negotiating track aimed a…

Buy/Free trial

Policy

17 May 2012 15:57

Germany increases EUA sales by 200,000 per week

LONDON, May 17 (Reuters Point Carbon) - Germany will next month increase the number of EUAs it sells…

Buy/Free trial

CDM/JI/AAU

17 May 2012 16:58

Belarus weakens 2020 climate pledge

LONDON, May 17, (Reuters Point Carbon) - Belarus has pledged to be legally bound to cut its emission…

Buy/Free trial

Policy

17 May 2012 11:23

U.N. delays climate fund meeting for second time

LONDON, May 17 (Reuters Point Carbon) - The first meeting of the Green Climate Fund (GCF), designed…

Buy/Free trial

Policy

17 May 2012 11:25

Climate deal milestones should be set this year-UN

LONDON, May 16 (Reuters) - Countries which agreed to sign a deal in 2015 to cut greenhouse gas emiss…

Buy/Free trial

Policy

17 May 2012 10:21

California's CO2 scheme may face further legal challenges: report

SAN FRANCISCO, May 16 (Reuters Point Carbon) – How California courts choose to classify the revenue…

Buy/Free trial

EU ETS

16 May 2012 18:01

EU energy chief favours carbon at 12-18 eur/t

LONDON, May 16 (Reuters) - European carbon prices should be at least twice their current value of ju…

Buy/Free tria

Finnish Mining Boom Prompts Regulation Backlash on Polluters

Finland’s mining companies stand to face tougher rules as environmental damage prompts regulators to check the Nordic nation’s mining boom.  Talvivaara Mining Co. (TALV), whose nickel mine discharges are turning nearby lakes saline, will be slapped with tighter guidelines on emissions and Nordic Mines AB (NOMI), a Swedish gold explorer, has endured calls by local residents for a temporary halt to its mining operations.  Finland’s natural resources, including gold, copper and nickel, have become lucrative as global demand for metals drives up prices.

Canada axes green advisory body

The Canadian government is to mark the 25th anniversary of its green business advisers by closing the agency down.  John Baird, Canada's foreign affairs minister and pointman for next month's Rio+20 Earth summit in Brazil, said this week that the National Roundtable for the Environment and Economy (NRTEE) would have its funding cut in 2013 because of the availability of information from thinktanks, the internet and universities.

Japan Solar-Device Shipments to Exceed 2.5 Gigawatts in Year

Japan’s shipments of solar-power devices will exceed 2.5 gigawatts in the year ending March 2013, said Mikio Katayama, chairman of the Japan Photovoltaic Energy Association, at a press conference.  The increase in cells and modules follows a decision by Japan to start preferential rate payments for electricity generated from renewable sources in July to encourage investment in clean energy.

Microsoft taxes itself - will it be enough to drive change?

This week, Microsoft is announcing an unusual initiative that it hopes will change how the company operates: an internal fee on carbon.  Starting July 1st - the beginning of the company's fiscal year 2013 - the software giant will charge all of its 100-plus global offices and datacenters a fee for every ton of carbon they produce (mostly from plugging into the electric grid, so-called 'indirect' emissions). The money collected will go to purchase Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) and carbon offsets, allowing Microsoft to declare itself carbon neutral.

Climate deal milestones should be set this year

Countries which agreed to sign a deal in 2015 to cut greenhouse gas emissions should set milestones this year to ensure the necessary work is done on time, the United Nations' climate chief said on Wednesday.

U.N. delays climate fund meeting for second time

The first meeting of the Green Climate Fund (GCF), designed to help to raise up to $100 billion a year for the world’s poorest countries, has been delayed for a second time after countries failed to agree who should sit on its board, the U.N. said Thursday.

UK carbon targets 'at risk over local authority funding cuts'

Funding cuts to squeezed local authorities are putting the UK's carbon targets at risk, the government's climate advisers warned in a report published on Thursday.  The Committee on Climate Change, the statutory body set up to advise ministers on how to meet the government's carbon targets, called for local authorities to be ordered do develop and implement plans to cut carbon emissions, with national funding to do so.