RIP European Carbon Market

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The European Parliament just voted down a measure that would have attempted to revive its carbon market, likely dooming it to a slow and undignified death. This was a last-ditch effort to drive the EU’s carbon price back to a level that would incentivize green reforms. And it failed.The EU has been the global laboratory testing the green agenda to see how it works. Today’s story means that the guinea pig died; the most important piece of green intervention in world history has become an expensive and embarrassing flop.

http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/04/16/eu-refuses-to-resuscitate-its-dying-carbon-market/

Well at least the bankers made a lot of money.

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Quote

The European Parliament just voted down a measure that would have attempted to revive its carbon market, likely dooming it to a slow and undignified death. This was a last-ditch effort to drive the EU’s carbon price back to a level that would incentivize green reforms. And it failed.The EU has been the global laboratory testing the green agenda to see how it works. Today’s story means that the guinea pig died; the most important piece of green intervention in world history has become an expensive and embarrassing flop.

http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/04/16/eu-refuses-to-resuscitate-its-dying-carbon-market/

Well at least the bankers made a lot of money.

The bankers didnt really make a lot of money. Every firm scrambled to create a climate derivative or carbon credit desk. Guess who once headed up a desk? The problem was that the credits created to fit into the Euro Trading Scheme were too expensive for investors. On the other side, the one's not meeting that standard had a value based on nothing but hopes and dreams and no liquidity. Institutions and corporations were willing to take a meeting because no one understood them and what laws might be coming demanding their use. The bankers were dialed into the pending litigation and were some of the few experts around. So there were some consulting fee's and almost no derivatives traded. Except for celebrities and green dolts who didnt understand how the credits actually worked no one wanted the product.

for the record, purchasing a credit does nothing to reduce emissions. only producing less emission reduces less emissions. I'm saying this to Leonardo Dicaprio and his fans. the credits were a mechanism used to implement tighter gov't regulations on emissions. Used away from a disciplined program of reductions, they are meaningless. My point is that no one who educated themselves on what they were bought them, so no bankers i know got rich.

pollution credits do work, fyi. google how we reduced acid rain and you will see that. i am specifically speaking of the carbon credit craze around the European Trading Scheme.

"The point is, I'm weird, but I never felt weird."
John Frusciante