Asia Society Meeting on Carbon Trading

Last night (4/7/08) at the Asia Society in New York City (70th St/Park Avenue), there was a terrific talk entitled "Carbon Trading Update: Business Opportunities for Asian Sustainable Infrastructure".

The main point of the talk was laid out early on by moderator Jon A. Anda, President, Environmental Markets Network and a trustee for the Asia Society (also a former Vice-Chair at Morgan Stanley).

Mr. Anda went through some basic background of the last several years that the carbon trading market has been around. He said that:

-Efficient CO2 mkt enables an efficient dynamic hedge of climate risk

-We don't have the tools yet to hedge the risk of BAD climate changes - the technological "tools" are simply not there yet

-We must limit quantities because you simply cannot tell people to "stop using carbon" and then just tax them more, for it will turn out like the cigarettes epidemic, where smokers just keep smoking and paying the higher taxes

If the US went to 80% reduction (70% by Senate) off its current usage ('08), the EU: 60% off it's 1990 usage (Merkel), and China 35% off its projected 2012 usage totals, then we would have an industry of hundreds of billions of dollars indeed possibly trillions.



And continued with the goals of the discussion, specifically to answer the following:


Carbon Trading: Is it a Good Idea?
Carbon Trading: Can it work?
Carbon Trading: Does it have a chance of being adopted in the US and then globally?

It was my general feeling that the panel of four that Mr. Anda moderated all answered yes to those three questions in one form or another.

First, a couple of definitions that I had no knowledge of going into the evening:


CCS - Carbon Capture and Storage - (from Wikipedia) Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is an approach to mitigate global warming by capturing carbon dioxide (CO₂) from large point sources such as fossil fuel power plants and storing it instead of releasing it into the atmosphere. Technology for large scale capture of CO₂ is already commercially available and fairly well developed. Although CO₂ has been injected into geological formations for various purposes, the long term storage of CO₂ is a relatively untried concept and as yet (2007) no large scale power plant operates with a full carbon capture and storage system.


CDM - The Clean Development Mechanism - an arrangement under the Kyoto Protocol allowing industrialised countries with a greenhouse gas reduction commitment (called Annex 1 countries) to invest in projects that reduce emissions in developing countries as an alternative to more expensive emission reductions in their own countries. A crucial feature of an approved CDM carbon credit is that it has established that the planned reductions would not occur without the additional incentive provided by emission reductions credits, a concept known as "additionality". (Wikipedia)

The panel was awesome. It featured:

Paul Ezekiel, Head of Global Carbon Trading, Credit Suisse
Peter Ho, Country Director, China, EcoSecurities
Timothy Profeta, Director, Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions (@ Duke)
V Raghuraman, Head of Energy, Envt, & Natural Resources, Confed of Indian Industry



The contrast of opinions and projections was awesome. If I could highlight one major point I took from each panel discussion member, it would be:



Ezekiel:
The CDM has 2 phases:
2005- 2007, which failed miserably because of its market design in which over-allocation of free carbon allowances killed the market, and we saw 0 impact on emissions.

2008-2012 Expecting much improvement based on a new market design and many of the "kinks" worked out.


Raghuraman:
India: A mixed outlook on CDM because they started late and as such are forced to mitigate.
Most big industrial players in India are public, however most initiatives come from the private/NGO sector, therefore we see a disconnect right now between those that want to implement and those that should implement. In fact, many of India's upcoming projects are not looking at CDM.

Profeta:
The US political outlook on the subject in terms of chances of passing this bill are:
10% chance this congress
90% chance next congress

All US presidential candidates: Clinton, Obama, and McCain are in favor of a system, most strongly backed by McCain of all candidates who got on board back in '01. This will happen next presidency (we should note that the McCain - Lieberman Carbon Reduction Senate Bill was written by Dr. Profeta, and later it transformed into the current McCain-Warren Bill) There will be a debate on Senate floor before the Memorial Day recess. The US is studying a 70% reduction in emissions by 2050 from the 2005 level.

There are currently 2 main issues:
1) CDM is under political attack
2) The US can and probably will go to another trading system and only allow for 15% of its emissions buying on Europe's carbon trading markets


There are 45 billion pounds of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere every year
67% of the total between now and 2050 is in the US and China.
Therefore, a bilateral deal could solve 2/3 of the problem



Ho
There are profit model issues here that need to be considered.
They looked at a wind farm investment in China that had an IRRof 4-5%, but if CDM credit trading could have been included, then the IRR would jump to 9-10%.

Moreover, this credit trading system is opposite to traditional building. In housing, you get the loan first, then you build. There are no such loans for CDM structures - you only enjoy the benefit three years after the reduced emissions are realized.