PrintJanuary 25, 2009
Hell Freezes: AP Cools to Carbon Credits
In a shocking development, the Associated Press reports on some specific examples of the carbon credit trade and finds that (a) they are costing people a lot of money, (b) they may do nothing to lower greenhouse gas emissions and (c) they incentivize the destruction of the environment and people's homes .
The AP quotes one Chinese man:
"Nobody asked if we wanted to move. The government just posted a notice that said, ‘Your home will be demolished.'"
The AP also quotes a Stanford University expert that the carbon trading mechanism "is an excessive subsidy that represents a massive waste of developed world resources."
What's happening is that the "developing world", spelled "China," is being paid money, mostly from Europe, to build hydro-electric dams. When those dam locations include natural habitat or people's homes, so long to habitat for flora, fauna and humans. The environmentalists are in a tizzy: global warming or habitat loss -- what to do, what to do?
As they ponder that conundrum, China, with the world's third largest economy, siphons money -- hundreds of millions of dollars -- from Europe and other Kyoto signatories of the developed world.
If the US joins Kyoto, as Barack Obama wants, it will join the crowd of countries paying China to evict people from their homes and build massive hydro-electric dams. In fact, it would become the biggest player in a market worth hundreds of billions of dollars in the near future. Guess which way the money will flow in that market -- into or out of the US?
None of this is surprising - except that the AP is reporting it.
