Cap-And-Trade 101: Using Markets to Fight Climate Change
With public support for capping carbon at last reaching critical mass, it's important that we focus now on how to implement a successful national system to cap and trade carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. For more than a decade, PPI has worked with Sens. Joe Lieberman and Tom Carper and other key congressional leaders on various proposals for setting up "cap-and- trade" systems to limit carbon emissions while also spurring innovative ways to cut pollution. Now that many skeptics of carbon-dioxide reduction have gotten religion, it's time to grapple with the political and technical challenges of launching a U.S. cap-and-trade system.
In this forum, PPI gathered business, environmental, and political leaders to examine how a cap-and-trade system can spur economic growth; why a cap delivers greater environmental certainty than other mechanisms; why U.S. businesses are embracing the cap-and-trade approach; how CO2 trading can spur investments in clean technology; and how "tailpipe trading" could bring the transportation system into a nationwide emissions market. The forum also explored the new Lieberman-Warner bill, which many believe will be the main vehicle for legislative action in Congress.
Panelists
Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del), (Listen!) vice chair, Democratic Leadership Council
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn) (Listen!)
Tim Profeta, director, Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, Duke University
Annie Petsonk, international counsel, Climate & Air Program, Environmental Defense
Steven L. Kline, vice president, corporate, environmental and federal affairs, PG&E
Roger Ballentine, PPI fellow, president of Green Strategies
Will Marshall, president, Progressive Policy Institute
Media Coverage
Lieberman open to climate change compromise
By Ryan Grim, The Politico, September 19, 2007
PPI Background
The Street Calls On Congress to Cap Carbon Now
By Jan Mazurek, PPI Front & Center, March 2007
The Global Climate Change Marketplace: Moving Forward Without the United States
By David J. Hayes, PPI Policy Report, February 2007