(12b) Carbon Management in the Post-Cap-and-Trade Carbon Economy

Many of the greatest achievements, and some of the most tragic events, of the twentieth century were the result of the countless ways that humanity learned to utilize the vast chemical energy and feedstock stores of carbon from the earth’s lithosphere. The wealth created by the extraction and conversion of fossilized carbon is matched only by the seemingly unlimited flexibility of carbon as the raw material building block used to feed, clothe, shelter, transport, defend, and otherwise create or destroy, in every aspect of human existence.

We anticipate the creativity that created this wealth will continue into the Cap-and-Trade era as carbon consumers endeavor to reduce the costs of CO₂ emissions under Cap-and-Trade.  Alternatives to atmospheric emissions will find their way into the marketplace as new forms of carbon cognates and general carbon detritus become increasingly attractive to carbon consumers.

What will be needed is a more comprehensive and encompassing metric to assess anthropogenic climate change. Such a metric will include assessments for anthropogenic changes in carbon flux and form, as well as all other changes to the environment and ecology as a result of human activity, including climate services embodied in international trade.

We envision such a climate change metric will be a multidimensional vector, developed and derived by scientific study and consensus as a measure of the environmental and ecological impact wrought by anthropogenic activities. We envision one such vector dimension will be a measure of anthropogenic changes in carbon flux, such as the extraction of coal, oil, or natural gas from the lithosphere, measured by the logarithmic change in residence time of carbon in a particular form.

We believe that each nation or jurisdiction will need to set their own price coefficient for each unit of climate change, reflecting their domestic carbon avidity. This flexibility will need to be balanced by price adjustments levied on trade at the border that reflect the domestic coefficient of the importing country.

As a means of researching, developing and implementing the broad metric for anthropogenic climate change, we suggest a study to determine the feasibility of a corporate charter framework for climate service corporations (CSCs) to collect fees for all climate services provided under the control of member state shareholders. Such a framework would include the duties and obligations for CSCs, trade and cooperation with other CSCs, and general CSC governance by the member state shareholders.