Carbon Management

In this brief paper, I look at the UNFCCC's carbon trading, CDM, and JI schemes with a skeptical eye. While these schemes have good intentions to lower GHGs, I claim they are relatively infective. Developing and developed countries have little incentive to build clean carbon emitting projects. It is difficult to argue against building cheap and dirty power plants that supply electricity that quickly improve the quality of life for millions of people.

In addition to the incentive problem, there is plenty of room for state subsidies to be misdirected to CDM projects that have little to do with actually lowering GHGs. For example, financing hydro-electric dams do more damage rivers, habitat, and species in less time than the projected impacts from climate change.

Next, I question existing corporations' intent when they finance CDM/JI projects. To me, it looks like another facet of greenwashing.

Finally, I briefly argue that mitigating GHGs to acceptable levels will not occur in a way that will prevent the impacts from climate change. In this respect, adaptation becomes the more appealing choice. However, the argument against adaptation is that it is not profitable and therefore hard to justify in the market place. I conclude that, unfortunately, adaptation to impacts will most likely occur ad-hoc and post-disaster.


CITATION: Cote, Michael, Carbon Trading and CDM, Development or Green Washing? (July 2008). Available at: http://umass.academia.edu/MichaelCote/Papers/344813/Carbon_Trading_and_CDM_Development_or_Green_Washing

Carbon Rationing Action Groups (CRAGs) are grassroots voluntary groups of citizens concerned about climate change, who set themselves a carbon allowance each year and provide support to members seeking to reduce their direct carbon emissions from household energy use and personal transport. Some groups have a financial penalty for carbon emitted in excess of the ration, and systems whereby under-emitters are rewarded using the monies collected from over-emitters. CRAGs therefore operate the nearest scheme in existence to the proposed policy of Personal Carbon Trading (PCT). This paper reports the findings of a study of the opinions and experiences of individuals involved in CRAGs (‘CRAGgers’). In general, interviewees have made significant behavioural changes and emissions reductions, but many would be unwilling to sell spare carbon allowances within a national PCT system. The choices made by CRAGgers with respect to the design and operation of their ‘carbon accounting’, their experiences of reducing fossil fuel energy use, and their views on personal carbon trading at CRAG and national level are discussed. Some possible implications for PCT and other policies are considered, as well as the limitations of CRAGs in informing an understanding of the potential impacts and operation of PCT.

This book focuses on issues related to a suite of technologies known as “Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS),” –which can be used to capture and store underground large amounts of industrial CO2 emissions. We address how CCS should work, as well as where, why, and how these CCS technologies should be
deployed, emphasizing the gaps to be filled in terms of research and development, technology, regulation, economics, and public acceptance.
The book is divided into three parts. The first part helps clarify the global context in which Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions can be analyzed, highlights the importance of fossil-fuel-producing countries in positively driving clean fossil-fuel
usage, and discusses the applicability of this technology on a global and regional level in a timely yet responsible manner. The second part provides a technical description of the elements of the CCS chain, with an emphasis on new technologies and the potential capabilities of future facilities. The third part provides a review of the economic, regulatory, social, and environmental aspects associated with CCS
development and deployment on a global scale, and offers a pragmatic way forward.
In conclusion, we provide recommendations and guidelines for sustainable/responsible CCS scale-up as a way to address prevailing global energy, environment, and climate concerns.

Significance: Through the medium of a pilot study on the Garden Cities Wolfson Economics Prize (UK) and the three main case studies (Catalonia/Netherlands/UK), the thesis investigates the key ideas of each project, evaluating their effectiveness related to sustainability and quality concepts. The exploration of European and UK large-scale projects is interpreted on a journey to innovative and successful landscape schemes, giving the opportunity to this thesis to evaluate their effectiveness and delivery with regards to low carbon and spatial quality. Rigour: The examination of the state of the art in regional landscape design concepts was based on the identification of the key ideas by current theory, the communication methods, and their impact to large-scale project development. Establishing collaborations with pioneer projects in Catalonia, the Netherlands and the UK, the study has developed a specific methodology that allows the identification of key issues, such as low carbon and quality of space, as well as the evaluation of their dissemination and interpretation through the landscape project process. A pilot study (Garden cities – Wolfson economics prize) followed by three case studies (Landscape Observatory, the Netherlands and HS2/HS2LV) are the main steps to evaluate the effectiveness of the processes followed and the best practices towards a sustainable and quality landscape design.
Originality: The contribution to knowledge of this thesis lies upon the identification and creation of sustainable strategic schemes that work effectively at the scale of landscape projects, affecting positively the way regions are conceptualized and addressed. The need for a project framework supported by policies and legislation that will secure the early integration of ideas such as low carbon, spatial quality and drawings, is identified as a significant step towards successful project implementation and impacts on the extent to which key issues will be delivered in strategic schemes. The recognition of drawings and visuals as communication tools, through the landscape project process, improves the understanding of the land and acts significantly in the interpretation of the landscape vision as well as the integration of key issues in strategic schemes. Evidence collected during the study indicates that innovative projects can form theory and therefore that the key issues of low carbon and spatial quality can be interpreted differently across Europe, playing distinct roles, and gaining significant importance to the landscape project process. Impact: The proposal for a common European and UK agenda related to strategic landscape schemes will share lessons of good practice suggesting ways to strengthen the areas of sustainable landscape development and it will improve understanding, communication, and implementation of low carbon and spatial quality, by sharing knowledge and adopting best practices, creating a sustainable environment.

By using carbon footprints, museum staff can manage the impact of their loan programs on climate change. To measure the environmental impact of loan activities, a new carbon footprinting methodology has been developed. The methodology includes an Environmental Impact of Loans (EIL) performance indicator, encouraging museums to set and achieve efficiency targets for loan activities. The methodology was developed using data from the Art Department of Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales. Based on this experience, evidence-based recommendations have been formulated to help museums reduce their impact on global warming.

Going against both the naive techno-optimist of ‘greening business as usual’ and a resurgent ‘catastrophism’ within green thinking and politics, The Politics of Unsustainability offers an analysis of the causes of unsustainability and diminished human flourishing. It makes a case for seeing that it is profound and deepening unsustainability and growing injustice that characterises the modern world, and that therefore the focus of green or other progressive thinking should shift from its current framing in terms of ‘sustainability’ ‘sustainable development’ and ‘theories of justice’. The books locates the causes of unsustainability in dominant capitalist modes of production, debt-based consumer culture, the imperative for orthodox economic growth and the dominant ideology of neo-classical economics. At the level of developing a progressive and critical theoretical understanding of unsustainability, it argues for the importance of integrating vulnerability, which has been largely neglected by both mainstream western political theory and analyses of the current global ecological crisis. It suggests that valuable insights into the causes of and alternatives to unsustainability can be found in a critical embracing of human vulnerability and dependency as both constitutive and ineliminable aspects of what it means to be human. Rather than seeing invulnerability as the appropriate response, the book defends resilience, the ability to ‘cope with’ rather than ‘solve’ vulnerability, as more productive. The Politics of Unsustainability offers a trenchant critique of the dominant neo-classical economic groupthink, which the book argues must be seen not as some value neutral form of ‘expert knowledge’ but as a thoroughly ideological ‘commonsense’ that has corrupted and limited creative ways of thinking about and through our current predicament. It offers a green political economic alternative which replaces economic growth with economic security, and views economic growth as having done its work in the minority, affluent world, which should now focus on human flourishing and lowering socio-economic equality and fostering solidarity as part of that new re-orientation of public policy. Complementing this green political economy, The Politics of Unsustainability outlines and develops an account of ‘green republicanism’, which represents an innovative and original contribution to debates on the political responses to the crises and opportunities that constitute global unsustainability. The Politics of Unsustainability draws widely from a range of disciplines and thinkers, from cultural critic Susan Sontag to the critical theory of the Frankfurt school, contemporary debates in green political thinking, and the latest thinking in heterodox and green economics, to produce a highly relevant, timely and provocatively original statement on the human predicament in the 21st century.

Nearly half of Britain’s carbon dioxide emissions result from the activity of households, both within the home and from personal transport. This research examines how the carbon dioxide emissions of households can be reduced, particularly through the calculation of carbon footprints and testing the public’s reaction to the concept of personal carbon allowances (PCAs). Two data collection stages were used - a postal survey providing quantitative data, followed by semi-structured interviews producing mainly qualitative data. The research was carried out in a largely rural district which is run by a council noted for its work on sustainable energy, Newark and Sherwood. The survey looked at PCAs as well as a variety of contemporary issues that might influence household footprints such as energy efficiency grants and information, as well as relationships with gas and electricity suppliers. Each interview involved the calculation of a household carbon footprint, the identification of measures to reduce it, and the gathering of attitudes about personal carbon allowances, in order to identify challenges and opportunities with respect to reducing household carbon emissions. Support for PCAs was higher than anticipated, and tended to be associated with those who were prepared to use public transport or cycle more, or were supportive of renewable energy in homes. Interviewees had much to say about individual carbon reducing measures. Opposition was associated with those who envisaged that they would be unlikely to sell carbon units. Regarding personal transport, long commutes were common, and the cost of public transport was of concern. Specific findings were made about domestic heating, insulation, lighting, refrigeration, water use, commuting, public transport, and rail as an alternative to short-haul flights. There was more interest in monetary savings than carbon savings. Recommendations about policy and regarding further research are made.

This introduction to "Negotiating Climate Change in Crisis" positions the volume as an intervention, collecting together indicative contributions regarding what social scientists, humanities scholars and climate activists around the world think needs to be done in terms of both understanding why climate action has failed to dramatically reduce emissions to date, and proposing some routes towards radical climate change action now. That is, the book is intended to provide an affirmative set of ideas about what is to be done and how it can be done, to bring about radical climate change governance so that we have a chance of avoiding runaway climate change. We are publishing this collection of essays in the months leading up to the high-profile and eagerly awaited COP26 UN climate change conference, due to take place in Glasgow (Scotland, UK) in November 2021. At this conference, all the major stakeholders of the global climate change negotiation process will be present, including heads of state, large national government delegations, policy advisers, NGO and social movement activists, multinational corporations, industry associations, and inter-governmental institutions. There will be significant media interest in COP26, reaching millions of people around the world, linked, for example, with the re-entering of the agreement by the US, the newly entwined crises of COVID-19 and climate change, and negotiations around the form and content of Green New Deal proposals. We hope that this collection of essays will contribute to this discussion. Despite more than thirty years of high-level, global talks on climate change, we are still seeing emissions rising dramatically around the world. Whatever we have done on this planet in terms of climate mitigation over the past thirty plus years has not worked. Given that most climate scientists believe we are soon running out of time, the authors contributing to this volume ask what has gone wrong and what now needs to be done. We hope the essays collated here will help us move more radically and urgently in the direction needed.

Enacting Environments is an ethnography of the midst of the encounter between corporations, sustainable development and climate change. At this intersection 'environmental management' and 'carbon accounting' are put into practice. Purportedly, these practices green capitalism. Drawing on fieldwork of day-to-day practices of corporate environmental accountants and managers, Ingmar Lippert reconstructs their work as achieving to produce a reality of environment that is simultaneously stable and flexible enough for a particular corporate project: to stage the company, and in consequence capitalism, as in control over its relations to an antecedent environment. Not confined to mere texts or meetings between shiny stakeholders co-governing the corporation – among them some of the world's biggest auditing firms, an environmental non-governmental organisation (NGO) and standards – control is found to be distributed across as well as limited to a myriad of practical work situations, involving spreadsheets and slide shows. Carbon accounting takes place in the midst of docile as well as dissident humans and nonhumans. As a result of this analysis, Enacting Environments establishes how carbon emission facts are produced and co-configure climate change realities. Ingmar Lippert argues: within capitalism, environment does not exist in the singular but in the plural; and these environments are not existing out there to be read off some anterior Nature but they are brought into social, economic and political existence in the practices of accounting for them. Providing a portfolio of methods to study techno-managerial engagement with carbon, Ingmar Lippert shows how much is overlooked in received theories of corporate environmental accounting, theories of the performativity of environmental economics and, ultimately, the epistemic and ontic effects of fact-making in the heart of neoliberal capitalism.

cite as: Ingmar Lippert (2013). Enacting Environments: An Ethnography of the Digitalisation and Naturalisation of Emissions. PhD Dissertation in Sociology, University of Augsburg, Augsburg.

Water is an important resource for all countries and is crucial for their development. It is a fundamental resource: it allows life on our planet, and from an anthropocentric perspective, it is crucial from all our varied biological, cultural and economic processes. The
objective of this dissertation is to propose rainwater harvesting (RWH) as a means to achieve sustainable water management in Mexico. Based on a case study in a single neighbourhood of Morelia, Mexico, this dissertation draws a comparison between mains water (baseline) and RWH, with special emphasis on carbon management benefits. The main finding is that by using RWH there is a potential to mitigate 24.7 tCO2 per year, meaning that these kinds of projects can enter the Clean Development Mechanism scheme to tackle Climate Change.
Regarding the economic analysis, a Net Present Value analysis was carried out which showed positive results, demonstrating the economic viability of the project.

The Dipterocarp forest based agroforestry system in Lampung, Indonesia has vast potential to develop sustainable management strategies. The agroforest has successfully protected tropical rainforest in Sumatra Island from deforestation, in particular Bukit Barisan Selatan National Park. It also has high biodiversity, as well as a natural forest, and is a promising area to study carbon sequestration as the agroforest is sustained in area buffering the national park. Numerous studies have been conducted to estimate the potential of aboveground biomass and carbon per unit area; however the distribution of biomass or carbon over large areas and continuously mapping the carbon has not been previously documented.
It is necessary to estimate the total carbon of forest or agroforest biomass by using satellite remote sensing technology since the area of Indonesian forests and agroforest are very large. However, ground truth checking such a large area would be time consuming and expensive; and the results may be affected by changes in the vegetation structure over the duration of the survey. The challenge of using remote sensing technology still has not yet to be fully answered along with the most means by which to fully exploit the possibilities produced by the launching of new different images with different resolutions and capabilities. The use of satellite remote sensing technology is the most preferable method as it is the most effective way to estimate biomass or carbon in terms of time and budget over a large area. Moreover, this method is also effective in monitoring changes in biomass and carbon year on year. This study is therefore critical, due to the lack of similar studies in Indonesia, especially on Sumatera Island.
This study aims to estimate the total biomass and biodiversity value in Damar agroforest; and investigate the relationship between the carbon stock in agroforest biomass and the pixel value (digital information contained in a satellite image), such as spectral band ratios and vegetation indices, and continued mapping the carbon. In addition, simple linear regression and multiple linear regression were applied to analyze the single spectral band ratios of 1 to 5 and 7; and it was also applied 10 vegetation indices such as Simple Ratio 4/3, NDVI, SAVI, Brightness, Greenness, Wetness, TNDVI, ND 73, Simple Ratio 7/3, and Ratio 327 as a biomass predictor. That significant correlation between those two parameters was found to hold the potential to facilitate carbon mapping in large Damar agroforest areas. In the future, the estimation and monitoring of carbon stock can be estimated and predicted simply by analyzing the satellite imagery without the necessity of conducting a large and expensive field truth
2
survey for all areas of Damar agroforest in Lampung, Indonesia and in other similar sites.
The results found the dominate species (51 %) was Shorea javanica belonging to family of Dipterocarpaceae. In addition, 73 species belonging to 35 families were identified and in addition to 15 herbaceous species belonging to 12 families. The Dipterocarp forest based complex agroforestry was predicted to be a final phase of agroforest with basal area of 35.12 m2/ha. The average of aboveground biomass was 416.96 ton/ha, thus the carbon content density was 208.48 ton C/ha. The value of carbon content was nearly comparable to that of a natural Dipterocarp forest in Sumatra and Kalimantan.
Biodiversity was identified by using the Species Richness, the Shannon – Wiener index, and the Simpson index. The Species Richness methods identified 88 species include 73 species of tree and 15 species of herbaceous. In addition, the Shannon - Wiener index was calculated at 2.37, therefore biodiversity in Damar agroforest was moderately stable and the distribution of species abundance in the moderate category. The dominant of species based on the Simpson index which was found to be 0.7. Thus 70 % of Damar agroforest areas might be dominated by one or more species. Based on species distribution, the dominate species was Shorea javanica belong to Dipterocarpaceae (51%), Lansium domesticum belong to Maliaceae (11%), and Durio zibethinus belong to Malvaceae (6%).
The analysis of variance (ANOVA) was applied to find the significant model of carbon and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) was validated the model with the lowest value. The significant model was successful in finding in spectral reflectance at band 7. In addition, the model based on simple linear regression produced of R2 = 0.44; F stat. = 14.88 > F crit. = 4.38, p-value = 0.001, df = 1, 19; and the model has the lowest value of RMSE = 52.84. This model was chosen as the ideal model to predict a carbon content in Damar agroforest with equation Y = 267.83 – 1625.5 band 7. Based on the analysis, the model was feasible to map the carbon; with the total carbon content in 44,008.11 ha of Damar agroforest was to be 5,729,586.76 tons C. The average of carbon content was estimated to be 130.19 ton C/ha, as such carbon content is nearly equal to that of Dipterocarp forest. It is important to maintain the Damar agroforest ecosystem services with high biodiversity as well as natural forest; furthermore it is a preferable site for carbon trading.

Global warming is an existential threat to humanity and the rapid energy transition, which is required, will be the defining social, political and technical challenge of the 21st century. Practical experience and research results of recent years have showed that our actions to cover the gap between real situation and aims of climate agreements are not enough and that improvements in climate policy are needed, primarily in the energy sector. It is becoming increasingly clear that hydrocarbon resources, which production volume is increasing annually, will remain a significant part of the global fuel balance in the foreseeable future. Taking this into account, the main problem of the current climate policy is a limited portfolio of technologies, focused on replacement of hydrocarbon resources with renewable energy, without proper attention to an alternative ways of decreasing carbon intensity, such as carbon sequestration options. This study shows the need to review the existing climate policy portfolios through reorientation to CO2 utilization and disposal technologies and in terms of forming an appropriate appreciation for the role of hydrocarbon industries as the basis for the development of CO2-based production chains. In this paper we argue that: (1) focusing climate investments on a limited portfolio of energy technologies may become a trap that keeps us from achieving global emissions goals; (2) accounting for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions losses, without taking into account the potential social effects of utilization, is a barrier to diversifying climate strategies; (3) with regard to hydrocarbon industries, a transition from destructive to creative measures aimed at implementing environmental projects is needed; (4) there are no cheap climate solutions, but the present cost of reducing CO2 emissions exceeds any estimate of the social cost of carbon.

Advancing the domestic industrial production towards a sustainable, resource-preserving direction can become an important pillar to support competitiveness in the European Union, as well as in Hungary. Reaching the de-carbonization goals for industrial production via lowering the production volume may result in less desirable macro-economic effects, so decisions which concern the industry require a lot of attention from the climate policy as well. In the case of the cement sector, economic actors have to be motivated to make energy-efficiency investments and technology developments, which also show promise in terms of business efficiency. In the more natural-resource-intensive branches of the industry, both innovations and technological developments will be required to reduce the amount of used non-renewable energy
resources, keep it in the industrial cycle, and reduce environmental load. The importance of greener cement will be essential in the near future to reduce the sector’s CO2 emission levels. We need to identify more sector branches which relate to sustainability, which can aid the country in establishing long-term competitiveness that points towards the de-carbonization goals. The cost-efficiency aspects of this development
process are the most tedious questions in today’s business planning.

Carbon stock estimation was conducted in tree species of Sem
Mukhem sacred forest in district Tehri of Garhwal Himalaya, Uttarakhand, India. This forest is dedicated to Nagraj Devta and is dominated by tree species, including Quercus floribunda, Quercus semecarpifolia and Rhododendron arboreum. The highest values of below ground biomass density, total biomass density and total carbon density were
(34.81±1.68) Mg⋅ha-¹, (168.26±9.04) Mg⋅ha-¹ and (84.13±4.18) Mg⋅ha-¹
for Pinus wallichiana. Overall values of total biomass density and total
carbon density calculated were 1549.704 Mg⋅ha-¹ and 774.77 Mg⋅ha-¹ respectively. Total value of growing stock volume density for all species was 732.56 m3⋅ha-1 and ranged from (144.97±11.98) m3⋅ha-1 for Pinus wallichiana to (7.78±1.78) m3⋅ha-1 for Benthamidia capitata.

China has embarked on an ambitious and unprecedented programme of energy reform and climate change mitigation. Yet the motivations for this important shift remain unclear. This paper surveys key central government documents and articles by China's leading energy academics to investigate the ideas influencing China's new energy and climate policies. Three key ideas in particular are supportive of greater climate mitigation than in the past. First, domestic energy security concerns have risen on the central government agenda as a result of electricity shortages and rapidly rising energy consumption. Such concerns have deeply influenced China's ambitious and largely successful energy efficiency policies. Second, growing awareness of the environmental constraints on economic growth in general, and the potential damages of dangerous climate change in particular, has prompted stronger official rhetoric in favour of green development. The appearance of targets and policies that specifically target carbon emissions reductions in the 12th FYP for the first time suggests that climate change mitigation is becoming a motivation for policy action in its own right, rather than simply a co-benefit of policies enacted for other purposes. Third, a conviction that the world is moving towards low-carbon energy forms has given rise to the belief that China must become a technological and economic leader in this transition. Large levels of public financing to support the development of China's wind power and solar PV sectors suggests that the Chinese government has strong vested interests in seeing China successfully compete and lead in global low-carbon energy markets. In order to understand the shift in China's approach to climate change since the 11th FYP, it is important to understand how new ideas such as these have reframed and reshaped the Chinese government's interests and objectives.

ABSTRACT The way that carbon accounting is done greatly influences the value attributed to maintaining tropical forests. Accounting choices will be determining factors in the role that Brazil’s Amazon forest plays in global mitigation efforts and in the role that funds from mitigation will play in redirecting the course of history in Amazonia. Critical decisions include the form of accounting (stocks versus flows) that are applicable under different circumstances, baselines for establishing additionality, and the restrictions and adjustments (including discounting to attribute value to time) applied to reflect differences in permanence, leakage and uncertainty. None of these problems is insurmountable, but addressing them will require both academic effort and the political courage of decision-makers to act on available information.

How does a corporation know it emits carbon? Acquiring such knowledge starts with the classification of environmentally relevant consumption information. This paper visits the corporate location at which this underlying element for their knowledge is assembled to give rise to carbon emissions. Using an Actor-network theory (ANT) framework, the aim is to investigate the actors who bring together the elements needed to classify their carbon emission sources and unpack the heterogeneous relations drawn on.

Based on an ethnographic study of corporate agents of ecological modernisation over a period of 13 months, this paper provides an exploration of three cases of enacting classification. Drawing on Actor-Network theory, we problematise the silencing of a range of possible modalities of consumption facts and point to the ontological ethics involved in such performances. In a context of global warming and corporations construing themselves as able and suitable to manage their emissions, and, additionally, given that the construction of carbon emissions has performative con-sequences, the underlying practices need to be declassified, i.e. opened for public scrutiny. Hence the paper concludes by arguing for a collective engagement with the ontological politics of carbon.

The essay compares novel solutions and pilot ideas being researched to convert CO2 into products, primarily biofuels. It looks at the general principles involved in one particular technique designated as “cyanobacterial photosynthesis” and then explains the advantages and challenges
encountered in this context.

This report presents the findings of research into people’s attitudes to household carbon emissions. A postal survey of 334 households and face to face interviews of 15 households were conducted in Newark and Sherwood District. They showed that support for personal carbon allowances (PCAs) outweighed opposition, and that the level of support varied between certain population sub-groups which had differing views of a range of related issues, such as use of public transport. People are strongly motivated by financial savings as much as by carbon savings.