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Sandbag's YouTube video
Carbon trading explained through biscuits.
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- Prashant
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carbon trading
Why offsetting can be upsetting
I met a great journalist last week who has been trying to get under the skin of the offsetting industry, including by visiting some of the projects people are investing in to create the emissions 'reductions' that people are buying to compensate for their own 'unavoidable'* emissions.
I can completely see why the offsetting industry has sprung up and why it is growing at such a fast pace. As awareness of climate change rises it is natural to want to be able to do something about it. But offsetting is fraught with moral hazard. The guys who set up www.cheatneutral.com have brilliantly highlighted one of the problems - does paying someone not to do something bad, so you can continue, really help things? ...continues
We think
Have been reading Charles Leadbeater's book "We Think" which is fascinating. A summary of the themes is here on YouTube.
'Crowd sourcing' or enabling mass innovation could be a great model for getting permits out of the emissions trading scheme. One of the keys to enabling successful 'we think' collaborations is having discreet tasks that can be shared out and then built back together, lego style, to create a final outcome.
From the Blog
The times they are a-changing (and other clichés)
So much will be written, has already been written, about this historic US election that it seems pointless to add to the cacophony, but there really is nothing else that warrants writing about right now. The EU carbon price may be elegantly swan-diving and the reasons are interesting, but if there is one thing that will positively affect the future of the global carbon market it’s tonight’s result.
If the US elects Obama and we witness the dawn a new era in international relations in the US then the chances of working out a new climate deal are substantially improved. But, as with the last one, with regard to the nature of that deal what the US wants it will almost certainly get – such is the importance that everyone – Europe, China, India, Africa - places on getting them back in the game. Not only because they are such a huge source of emissions but also because the US has such a fantastic track record in incubating and commercialising new technologies.