« ArvinMeritor and Wal-Mart to Develop Hybrid Drivetrain for Class 8 Tractor | Main | US Governors Urge Aggressive Acceleration of Development, Production and Deployment of Ethanol »
Forecast: US and Canada Will Regulate CO2 by End of Decade
10 January 2007
A new report from CIBC World Markets, the wholesale and corporate banking arm of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC), forecasts that all jurisdictions in Canada and the US will have carbon dioxide regulations in place by the end of the decade to address global warming concerns.
The report predicts that every province and state in North America will follow the lead of California and implement not only a CO2 emissions cap but also an emissions trading system that will allow larger polluters to buy emissions credits from other firms whose emissions are less than what is allowed under the cap.
While North America has ignored implementing the Kyoto Accord, public concern about global warming is growing. I expect this will force governments to declare war on carbon emissions on their own terms. As that campaign unfolds, the economy’s largest emitters of CO2 will become increasingly dependent on the economy’s greenest firms for emissions credits.
—Jeff Rubin, Chief Strategist and Chief Economist at CIBC World Markets
The report states that the carbon abatement policies aimed at addressing climate change will have the greatest impact on the energy sector. This will have a significant impact in Canada where the sector accounts for 20% of the country’s CO2 emissions.
That percentage promises to rise steadily over the next decade as emissions-intensive oil sands production doubles and perhaps even triples, replacing depleting but less emission-intensive conventional oil production.
However, the report warns:
The real impact of climate change, and attendant carbon abatement legislation, will instead be felt on the supply curve. If planned additions to bitumen production are delayed or mothballed altogether, oil prices can only move in one direction—higher. To the extent that oil sands production cannot grow, neither can global crude supply, because, net of depletion, oil sands and deep-water wells are where the new supply will come from.
Conventional oil production has now not grown for over two years. Climate change also poses threats to production from deep-water wells. Gulf of Mexico production was spared last year the devastation it sustained in the 2005 record storm season, but most models of climate change predict increasing cyclonic activity in the region—home to 1.5 million barrels per day of crude production.
Resources:
The Carbon Wars (CIBC World Markets)
January 10, 2007 in Climate Change, Emissions, Policy | Permalink | Comments (34) | TrackBack (0)
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/22062/7449306
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Forecast: US and Canada Will Regulate CO2 by End of Decade:
Comments
Climate Infection
Regulation of exhaust gas should assist us to decrease,
By cutting down harmful emissions right now we need to police,
Presently the burning of our fossils holds no steady bounds,
And the climate is the shock absorber taking the incoming rounds,
Yet our atmosphere is what provides us oxygen to breath,
What is hurt we must defend because it gives us what we need,
If we stuff it full with cabons and with gas that holds in heat,
Then energy must faster flow and cause the weather to unseat,
Stronger storms, raised wind velocity and oceans steady rise,
Filling low lands and low cities with a watery disguise,
And the fields from which we take our food may suffer worse than we,
Sudden rain or lengthened drought may be the future that we see,
Regulations give us warning to prevent the misdirection,
So homes and lives will not be hurt by rising climate gas infection.
adrianakau@aol.com
Posted by: Adrian Akau | Jan 10, 2007 1:31:12 PM
Adrian, nice poem.
I really hope we will regulate CO2 in the next year or two. The longer we put that off the worse things are going to get. Plus, climate change is getting higher and higher on peoples lists of concerns, so that should give a political push for carbon caps.
Posted by: Brad | Jan 10, 2007 1:51:08 PM
I would agree: The sooner the better.
I would suggest that, rather than cap and trade, a carbon tax be used. Cap and trade has not shown to be very effective in the EU and addresses only industrial emitters. The carbon tax should be gradual and relentless to a level-perhaps doubling the cost of coal. The carbon tax should be across the board on all fossil fuel.
The revenue generated should not be kept by the taxing government but split between 150% rebates for sequestered CO2 and the remainder equally divided between all citizens.
Posted by: Bill Young | Jan 10, 2007 3:09:39 PM
I agree with you Bill. Hitting the individual pocket book with a progressive GHG tax on all CO2 emitters would be easy to aplly and very effective on a 10+ year period.
The rates + application dates should apply to all States (+ neighboring countries) and be known to ALL early in the first year of the program.
What to do with the $billions in new revenues should be opened to public debates. However, you have to be careful that it (the carbon tax) does not go back in the very same pocket books it came from. This could nolify the whole exercise.
Cleaning up the power generation plants, develop and manufacture lower cost high efficency PHEVs batteries, improve the national power grid, actively support the production of alternative clean energies and of course reduce income taxes for low income people so they can afford to pay the carbon tax, etc.
Posted by: Harvey D. | Jan 10, 2007 3:46:52 PM
Coal plants are now able to expand 20% of plant value with no cleanup at all. This is the wrong direction. If they had to pay credits to renewable sources for their carbon emissions, then sooner or later they would find that cleanup and IGCC makes sense and in the mean time we get more renewable energy sources.
Posted by: SJC | Jan 10, 2007 4:02:05 PM
I don't like carbon taxes because they are inherently regressive. Artificially high energy prices will hit the poor and middle class the hardest and will increase inflationary pressures to boot.
And I guarentee you that the government would become addicted to that particular revenue stream. I think I saw a commenter from Europe complain that a goverment official was resisting lowering taxes on biofuels to encourage consumption because of the lower revenues that would result.
The problem with converting to renewable sources is that they both have to displace fossil fuels AND cope with increasing demand. Renewables are currently less than five percent of our energy needs, and even though solar and wind are experiencing double-digit yearly increases, they cannot yet displace coal or oil.
Posted by: Cervus | Jan 10, 2007 7:21:37 PM
Cervus,
I agree that a carbon tax is, by itself, highly regressive. I recommend, however, that the revenue collected be split between sequestration rebates and the citizenry. The sequestraton rebates should be capped at 50% of the revenue.
The tax is levied, not only on the individual (indirectly) but also on commerce in general. The commercial taxation would exceed the indirect individual tax. If the payments distributed to the citizenry are at least 50% of the revenue, the tax and rebate together become progressive rather than regressive.
It is important that the rebate, other than the sequestration rebates, be made per capita, not proportional to consumption and not to corporate entities.
The tax is inflationary, as is any sales or ad valorem taxation. The rebates are compensatory.
If you do not raise the price of fossil fuels you will not seriously reduce consumption. It is too high a risk to expect to adequately address global warming with technological innovation alone.
Posted by: Bill Young | Jan 10, 2007 8:08:28 PM
Cervus,
I would agree with you that we cannot expect renewables to replace fossil and support expanding demand. I do believe that nuclear is, however, up to the job. It is well suited to baseload generation, which is not the forte of intermittent renewables. It is also lower cost per kwh than any of the renewables (except hydro which is pretty well tapped out in the US).
Posted by: Bill Young | Jan 10, 2007 8:17:17 PM
Carbon taxes are not regressive except for, perhaps, home heating; rich people use a great deal more energy (directly and indirectly) than poor people. Isn't that just about the definition of wealth?
This nation could use a Civilian Insulation Corps.
Posted by: Engineer-Poet | Jan 10, 2007 8:42:06 PM
Bill:
Frankly, your proposal seems more like a wealth redistribution scheme, which I oppose just on principle. If you're going to take the money, do something useful with it like funding R&D projects.
Posted by: Cervus | Jan 10, 2007 9:20:04 PM
R&D is only half of the puzzle; the other half is making the right things attractive to develop instead of creating perverse incentives. Taxes on GHG's help shift the attraction away from problem fuels and processes towards ones which create no problems or even create benefits.
Posted by: Engineer-Poet | Jan 10, 2007 9:26:19 PM
Average US family spends 3.5% of income to fuel their cars. How much taxes should be slapped on gasoline to reduce demand and reduce CO2 emissions somehow noticeably? Double or triple price of gasoline? Does not work in Europe, their vehicular CO2 emissions are growing steady and quite substantially. Same in Japan.
Posted by: Andrey | Jan 10, 2007 11:27:01 PM
Andrey -
while you rightly point out that high taxes on all forms of energy in Europe (not just motor fuels) have not halted growth in aggregate consumption, it is also true that Western European economies require only about half as much energy per unit of GDP as the US and Canada do.
That would suggest that some variation of a carbon tax could substantially reduce CO2 emissions in North America. Not only would this sustain the innovation and adoption of energy-efficient technologies even if oil prices dip if and when OPEC decides it wants them to, it would also sharply reduce indirect costs such as military engagement in the Middle East and perhaps in the long term, insurance premiums for coastal and offshore property.
Cervus -
you rightly point out that a carbon tax would be regressive, especially since a lot of low earners are forced to accept relatively long commutes to work. However, you can compensate for this by relieving the income tax burden on this group. The bottom line is not any individual tax but rather the total marginal rate for an individual or family (sum of all taxes paid divided by gross income).
Posted by: Rafael Seidl | Jan 11, 2007 2:31:23 AM
Rafael -
As it stands today in the U.S., low earners pay almost no income tax; it's very nearly been completely relieved already. The last numbers I saw showed that the bottom 50% of earners here pay only 3.6% of aggregate income taxes. I suppose you could go for relief of payroll taxes or something similar, but that's a whole 'nother can of worms.
No, if we're going to have a carbon tax, everyone should suck it up - just as we all suck up the existing taxes on gasoline and diesel.
Posted by: Matthew | Jan 11, 2007 5:59:50 AM
And yet global warming and climate change will very likely hit at the same time anyway. Still maybe it will cushion the horrors to come. A smidge.
Posted by: wintermane | Jan 11, 2007 6:20:16 AM
Cervus,
It was me who complained about our Minister of Finance, who does not worry about GHG enough to lower tax on bio fuels. And that is with a state budget surplus of around 10%!
In my mind it is OK that carbon tax is regressive, because a ton of CO2 from a poor guy hurts the environment just as much as a ton from a rich guy.
Suggestions for uses of carbon tax money:
1) payback to tax payers - equal amount of dollars for each tax payer. This way you end up saving on tax by cleaning up your act.
2) Energy R&D
3) Government guaranteed loans for insulation and other energy-saving technologies. With cheap financing, it should be possible to make money of energy saving from day one.
ps. Anyone interested in following wind power, total powre and electricity exchange in Denmark, realtime can do so by following this
link
I think it is pretty cool :)
You will notice that wind power is a quite substantial part of the total power production. Usually, when there is a lot of wind, the price in Denmark is low, thus we export a lot to our neighbourghs.
Posted by: Thomas Pedersen | Jan 11, 2007 6:45:37 AM
Wintermane is sage here - we're just thinking of ways to postpone the inevitable by months or a few years. However, being proponents of living in un-interesting times, we seek a path to slow the rate of climate change.
Poor people can't go out and buy the latest in efficient family transportation. Renters can't do much to insulate their homes, or install windows or a new heating/cooling system. Workers can't autonomously change the buildings where they work, or the machines with which they work. Engineer-Poet has it right that we very much need a Civilian Insulation Corps to provide subsidized labor to reduce heating/cooling costs for poor homeowners.
In order to reduce our carbon footprint, governments could set very high standards for the existing infrastructure, and CONDEMN inefficient structures, machines and processes. Owners would then RE-LICENSE their property (or acquire new), only being allowed to choose between the highly efficient or the super highly efficient solution. I know this is dictatory; but our world security requires compulsory rational action.
The alternative, a carbon tax, only works when best-technology is the widely available RULE, not the limited distribution option. Next, how does a society elicit the correct action from executives and individuals - by way of a thousand cuts? Human nature will cause the populace to respond by inaction, grumbling, and counter-productive choices in the voting booth.
In a choice between upgrading our infrastruction either by fiat or by taxation, I'll take the fiat. It can be framed in terms of doing one's part for the good of us all, in the battle against storms, floods and desertification. A fiat works on a known and controllable schedule. A tax will always be just a tax. Its effect can only be theorized, not known.
Posted by: JC | Jan 11, 2007 8:04:55 AM
Matthew, please give us a valid link to substantiate your claim-
"The last numbers I saw showed that the bottom 50% of earners here pay only 3.6% of aggregate income taxes."
Posted by: fyi CO2 | Jan 11, 2007 8:12:18 AM
FYI -
Here you go - this was from a U.S. House committee report in 2004, but I doubt the numbers have changed significantly since then:
http://www.house.gov/jec/press/2004/10-15-04.pdf
Posted by: Matthew | Jan 11, 2007 9:39:15 AM
It seems like the state governors are taking the lead on this because the present administration refuses to. The administration is pushing nuclear and "clean coal" as the way, so that no one has to consider efficiency measures nor changing their life styles. They have cut NRELs budget every year, so it seems like renewable energy is not their favorite topic either.
Posted by: SJC | Jan 11, 2007 10:03:04 AM
Thanks for the link Matthew.
Yes, the rich pay a lot of taxes as a total percentage of taxes collected, but they don’t pay a lot of taxes as a percentage of what they can afford to pay, or as a percentage of what the government needs to close the deficit gap. The rich pay a lot less in tax as a percentage of his income.
I vote for a carbon tax with rebates back to the poor, balance to (valid, not just political) alternative energy.
Posted by: fyi CO2 | Jan 11, 2007 10:57:26 AM
As the income distributon in the US becomes more and more unequal, of course the lower half pays less and less taxes as a percentage of that total. Is that a reason to tax the lower half more or tax the rich less ? Maybe a little bit of income redistribution wouldn't be that bad, given that over 30 million Americans, including several million children, went hungry last year ...
Posted by: lambreja | Jan 11, 2007 11:45:34 AM
matthew; How can the millions working for $5.50/hr pay more taxes and feed their family? Until such time as they get $7+/hr they should pay NO income taxes and be refunded a set amount for carbon taxes (say on the first 5 to 10 gal/week or so). This way people on low wages and with smaller more effcient cars would pay a lot less carbon taxes. People with higher revenues + gas guzzlers would pay a lot more.
Posted by: Harvey D. | Jan 11, 2007 11:56:03 AM
Wow...looks like I accidentally hit a nerve with that comment on income taxes! The only point I was going for was to point out that it's not possible to relieve income taxes on people who largely don't pay them.
FYI - No, the rich pay more in income taxes, both in absolute dollars as well as a percentage of their income. Some politicians like to pretend the rich "don't pay their fair share", but they're lying.
Lambreja - I think you've fallen for that discredited survey about hunger in America. If I remember correctly, anyone who agreed that they had gone to bed feeling hungry for any reason even once in the last year was considered 'hungry'.
Harvey - If *absolutely necessary* the earned income tax credit could be increased, I suppose, but the link between carbon emissions and higher taxes shouldn't be broken. Poor people shouldn't escape the incentives to change their wasteful ways any more than the rest of us should.
Posted by: Matthew | Jan 11, 2007 12:48:38 PM
An alternative to cap and trade is cap and share. Cap carbon emissions and share the allocations. See
Posted by: JN2 | Jan 11, 2007 12:53:31 PM
If we can have an Earned Income Tax Credit, we can have an Energy Efficiency Tax Credit (the more efficient you are, the more of it you get to keep).
Posted by: Engineer-Poet | Jan 11, 2007 4:03:23 PM
So the low income guy driving a big Chevy pickup for work pays a carbon tax which he then gets partially rebated at the end of the year so he can continue to buy fuel for his big pickup truck. These people cannot afford to buy new cars capriciously.
Energy efficiency credit might get this guy to change lifestyle energy usage AND trade in for lower footprint vehicle.
Rich - poor debates are transparently divisive.
Posted by: gr | Jan 11, 2007 6:20:16 PM
Frankly, your proposal seems more like a wealth redistribution scheme, which I oppose just on principle. If you're going to take the money, do something useful with it like funding R&D projects.
Cervus, policies affect supply and demand which redistributes income. The only choice is whether it is to be done overtly or covertly.
Posted by: APosterFormerlyKnownAsAndy | Jan 11, 2007 8:22:01 PM
The main fear is that id gas stays high too long no matter why people will simply stop traveling as much and if that happens a ton of the econ wich is based on such people buying and eating and so on will go splat.
Imagine what happens to new york if turrism to new york drops even 25% and stays there.. 505 90%? If the tax is large eough to make a n important effect its first effect will be to kill off tourist towns and yourist cties.And both sides of the politcal fense are well aware of that.
Many of these so called wonder cities soo called effiecent and cleaner then the s[awr; only pay for themsevles with tourist money and how do you exoiect that to keep up?
Posted by: wintermane | Jan 12, 2007 1:46:06 AM
I'm with those who say carbon taxes won't work. The only way to reduce is to ration.
Posted by: tom deplume | Jan 12, 2007 10:31:27 AM
The people who say "carbon taxes won't work" seem to mostly be the same people who say "gas taxes won't work" (they certainly do, look at Europe and Japan) and even "income taxes reduce the incentive to work harder", which directly contradicts their claims about the first two.
Rations can be twiddled for "people in need", and would have to be to avoid devastation when technology doesn't keep pace with falling limits. Caps also ignore the pace of change. Tradeable permits fluctutate in value, which makes it much harder for investors to justify carbon-saving changes. Carbon taxes are the one system which cannot be gamed except by outright fraud and have certainty to drive investment.
Posted by: Engineer-Poet | Jan 12, 2007 4:25:04 PM
Despite the difficulties in valuation, tradeable permits do tend to cost less per unit of reduction. In that way, they are better for the country/world/whatever as a whole. Some communities will fare worse than others under a trading scheme so they aren't perfect.
Posted by: APosterFormerlyKnownAsAndy | Jan 13, 2007 11:42:06 PM
Um one big reason h2 has garnered such a following in industry is because it sidesteps all the likely gas taxes and emmissions taxes and ghg taxes and blah blah blah.
You look at the companies serious in h2 work and you see sports cars and subs and suts and lux cars. Because those are highly profitable and because regulations could fubar them up but going h2 could unfubar em.
So what will the rich be doing? Avoiding the massive fees and taxes via h2 cars... Yes h2 itself is more expensive per unit but per mile driven specialy with ghg taxes and whatnot piled onto ven biofuels..... who knows...
And in the future it might becme IMPOSSIBLE for the car makers to make an suv if it has a traditionalmilage figure attached to it... but a hybrid fuel cell suv???
Posted by: wintermane | Jan 15, 2007 4:00:27 AM
There is global warming but it is not man made. Climate change is part the earth natural cycle for the past four million years. Since human beings have been around for about a million years give or take, it would seem to people that global warming is something that we are all doing.
The only upside to using CFL’s and driving hybrids is, That in time along with other alternative fuel sources and limited drilling ANWAR along nuclear power. That we will cut our dependency on oil from countries that support terrorism and help in stopping people who want to kill every man, woman, and child because the majority of the people in this country do not follow Muslim beliefs
Also, I would like to also point out that our planet is not the only plant with climate change. The seven other planets and former planet Pluto is warming up as well.
If that isn’t enough, According to data from NASA .It states that 1934 was the hottest year of the last century. What are we going to now? Have senior citizens buy carbon offsets with their Social Security and pensions.
Posted by: David Haft | Aug 18, 2007 6:11:33 PM
