Post by Watchman on Mar 27, 2007 12:11:03 GMT -5
U.S. Trilateral Commission debates ways to curb energy use and fight climate change
Bloomberg News, Reuters, The Associated Press
Published: March 19, 2007
BRUSSELS: The United States must act to cap its emissions of greenhouse gases and join the fight against climate change or risk losing global leadership, a former CIA director said in a report issued Monday.
"The United States must adopt a carbon emission control policy," John Deutch, head of the Central Intelligence Agency in 1995-96, said in a report to the Trilateral Commission, a group of business and opinion leaders from Europe, the United States and Asia.
Deutch wrote that if the United States or any other country in the Organization for Economic Development "that is a large producer of greenhouse gas emissions is to retain a leadership role in other areas, it cannot just opt out of the global climate change policy process."
Deutch, an energy specialist who is now a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, also proposed an expanded use of nuclear power, international cooperation to develop clean coal technology and a sharing of the costs of emissions control between rich countries and large emerging nations.
During an interview with Bloomberg News, the European Union's taxation commissioner, Laszlo Kovacs, proposed using taxes to discourage pollution as part of the EU's fight against global warming.
"If we tax polluting technologies, if we tax polluting resources, then we can certainly change the proportion of environment-friendly" activity in business, Kovacs said.
The policy fits with a commitment to curb the use of fossil fuels and reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, pledged by leaders of the 27-nation EU at a March 9 summit meeting. Some European politicians see the chance to increase taxes and curb pollution as citizens have become more aware of climate change.
At a news conference with Kovacs after opening a conference on taxes and the environment, the German finance minister, Peer Steinbrück, said finance ministers would discuss the issue of using taxation to promote energy conservation as soon as next week.
"The understanding and the willingness to pay for it increased," Steinbrück said.
Just Monday, the Belgian government agreed on fresh budgetary measures to cut pollution and counter climate change.
It imposed taxes on the use of disposable shopping bags, foils and cutlery and on the use of carbon dioxide-polluting cars, which should yield €131 million, or $175 million, in additional income for 2007.
The government also would provide fiscal incentives for people using environmentally friendly energy.
The European Commission, the EU executive agency where Kovacs oversees taxation, has proposed raising taxes on diesel fuel in some countries and linking car taxes to how much the vehicles emit in carbon dioxide and other pollutants. Kovacs, who in November urged a shift of tax burdens away from labor to emissions, will explore further steps in a policy paper due March 28.
At the Trilateral Commission meeting, Deutch advocated an additional tax of about $1 a gallon, or 26 cents a liter, on gasoline, diesel fuel and other petroleum products in the United States, coupled with a tightening of fuel economy standards for U.S. car manufacturers, to encourage fuel efficiency and damp demand, while recognizing that such a move would be politically difficult.
He suggested that Washington use the same "cap and trade" system of limiting carbon dioxide emissions and issuing emissions permits to industry that can be traded, which the EU currently uses.
Deutch also listed so-called geotechnical measures under consideration to counterbalance climate change, including adding aerosols to the stratosphere, placing balloons or mirrors in the stratosphere and even "high altitude nuclear explosions to induce a nuclear 'spring.'"
These ideas were so risky and hard to demonstrate technically that they highlighted the need to redouble efforts to mitigate human-induced climate change.
While Deutch placed great expectations on carbon capture and sequestration technology to reduce emissions from coal-fired power stations, notably in China, a parallel report to the Trilateral Commission by a French energy executive, Anne Lauvergeon, cast doubt on that solution.
Lauvergeon, chief executive of Areva, which builds nuclear power stations, said the capture and storage of carbon emitted through the burning of fossil fuels was too often presented as a miracle solution.
This technology would "not play a significant role in the limitation of carbon emissions for half a century," she wrote.
Bloomberg News, Reuters, The Associated Press
Published: March 19, 2007
BRUSSELS: The United States must act to cap its emissions of greenhouse gases and join the fight against climate change or risk losing global leadership, a former CIA director said in a report issued Monday.
"The United States must adopt a carbon emission control policy," John Deutch, head of the Central Intelligence Agency in 1995-96, said in a report to the Trilateral Commission, a group of business and opinion leaders from Europe, the United States and Asia.
Deutch wrote that if the United States or any other country in the Organization for Economic Development "that is a large producer of greenhouse gas emissions is to retain a leadership role in other areas, it cannot just opt out of the global climate change policy process."
Deutch, an energy specialist who is now a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, also proposed an expanded use of nuclear power, international cooperation to develop clean coal technology and a sharing of the costs of emissions control between rich countries and large emerging nations.
During an interview with Bloomberg News, the European Union's taxation commissioner, Laszlo Kovacs, proposed using taxes to discourage pollution as part of the EU's fight against global warming.
"If we tax polluting technologies, if we tax polluting resources, then we can certainly change the proportion of environment-friendly" activity in business, Kovacs said.
The policy fits with a commitment to curb the use of fossil fuels and reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, pledged by leaders of the 27-nation EU at a March 9 summit meeting. Some European politicians see the chance to increase taxes and curb pollution as citizens have become more aware of climate change.
At a news conference with Kovacs after opening a conference on taxes and the environment, the German finance minister, Peer Steinbrück, said finance ministers would discuss the issue of using taxation to promote energy conservation as soon as next week.
"The understanding and the willingness to pay for it increased," Steinbrück said.
Just Monday, the Belgian government agreed on fresh budgetary measures to cut pollution and counter climate change.
It imposed taxes on the use of disposable shopping bags, foils and cutlery and on the use of carbon dioxide-polluting cars, which should yield €131 million, or $175 million, in additional income for 2007.
The government also would provide fiscal incentives for people using environmentally friendly energy.
The European Commission, the EU executive agency where Kovacs oversees taxation, has proposed raising taxes on diesel fuel in some countries and linking car taxes to how much the vehicles emit in carbon dioxide and other pollutants. Kovacs, who in November urged a shift of tax burdens away from labor to emissions, will explore further steps in a policy paper due March 28.
At the Trilateral Commission meeting, Deutch advocated an additional tax of about $1 a gallon, or 26 cents a liter, on gasoline, diesel fuel and other petroleum products in the United States, coupled with a tightening of fuel economy standards for U.S. car manufacturers, to encourage fuel efficiency and damp demand, while recognizing that such a move would be politically difficult.
He suggested that Washington use the same "cap and trade" system of limiting carbon dioxide emissions and issuing emissions permits to industry that can be traded, which the EU currently uses.
Deutch also listed so-called geotechnical measures under consideration to counterbalance climate change, including adding aerosols to the stratosphere, placing balloons or mirrors in the stratosphere and even "high altitude nuclear explosions to induce a nuclear 'spring.'"
These ideas were so risky and hard to demonstrate technically that they highlighted the need to redouble efforts to mitigate human-induced climate change.
While Deutch placed great expectations on carbon capture and sequestration technology to reduce emissions from coal-fired power stations, notably in China, a parallel report to the Trilateral Commission by a French energy executive, Anne Lauvergeon, cast doubt on that solution.
Lauvergeon, chief executive of Areva, which builds nuclear power stations, said the capture and storage of carbon emitted through the burning of fossil fuels was too often presented as a miracle solution.
This technology would "not play a significant role in the limitation of carbon emissions for half a century," she wrote.