Posted on 12/26/2008 1:38:25 PM PST by shielagolden
Delaware will receive $2.55 million from the state’s successful participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) auction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions allowances held Dec. 17. The entire 31,505,898 allowances offered by the 10 RGGI states were sold at a clearing price of $3.38 per allowance generating approximately $106.5 million for distribution among the 10 states.
Delaware offered 755,979 CO2 allowances for sale in this second RGGI auction and will receive the proceeds once all payments are made by successful bidders early next year. The revenues from the sale of RGGI allowances are dedicated to public benefit purposes as outlined in legislation passed last year by the Delaware General Assembly.
By law, auction proceeds are directed to energy efficiency and renewable energy efforts to be conducted by the new Sustainable Energy Utility (SEU) to low income weatherization and heating programs and to carbon emission abatement projects to be conducted in Delaware. Up to 10 percent of auction proceeds may be used to administer RGGI and climate change programs in DNREC. “The success of this week’s RGGI auction demonstrates how a market-based program can address one of our most pressing environmental challenges ��“ climate change,” said Delaware DNREC Secretary John Hughes. “RGGI’s environmental co-benefits are impressive ��“ significant and measurable reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, as well as investment funds for consumer-focused programs to help reduce long-term energy demand and costs.”
RGGI Inc. reported that 69 participants from the energy, financial and environmental sectors took part in the bidding, indicating a strong performance for RGGI CO2 allowance auctions. The demand for the allowances was “robust” at 3.5 times the available supply.
Delaware is one of ten Northeast states (Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont) pioneering RGGI ��“ the first market-based, mandatory cap-and-trade program in the U.S. to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The participating states adopted regulations to cap and then reduce the amount of CO2 that power plants in each state are allowed to emit, limiting the region’s total contribution of atmospheric greenhouse gas levels. Under RGGI, the 10 states will stabilize power sector carbon emissions at their capped level, and then reduce the cap by 10 percent at a rate of 2.5 percent each year between 2015 and 2018. The groundbreaking program may serve as a model for a possible federal cap-and-trade program.
RGGI intends to hold quarterly auctions during the first RGGI three-year compliance period, Jan. 1, 2009 to Dec. 31, 2011. The third auction will be held March 17, 2009.
All RGGI auctions are overseen by an independent market monitor, Potomac Economics, a leader in the field of monitoring and competitive assessment of wholesale electricity markets in the U.S. Allowance transactions are recorded on the Carbon Dioxide Allowance Tracking System (COATS) developed by Perrin Quarles Associates, which designs and builds emissions database tracking systems.
By participating in the auction, Delaware has met the commitment it made in Dec. 2005 when Governor Ruth Ann Minner joined with other Northeast governors and signed a Memorandum of Understanding. In the MOU, participating states committed to have the RGGI program in place by Jan. 1, 2009.
In July 2008, Governor Minner signed into law Senate Bill 263 that authorizes Delaware to participate in RGGI. The legislation, sponsored by Senator Harris McDowell and Representative Pam Thornburg, established the framework for Delaware’s program and authorized DNREC to adopt regulations to implement the law. On Oct. 15, 2008, Secretary Hughes approved Delaware’s RGGI regulation.
For more information on Delaware’s RGGI program, visit http://www.awm.delaware.gov/AQM/Pages/RegionalGreenhouseGasInitiative.aspx or for RGGI, Inc., visit http://www.rggi.org.
Crist is trying to do this. My hope is that the legislature will stop him. The FDEP just had their first workshop on this. It’s scary what they want to do to us.
Is Maryland really part of the Northeast? Isn’t the border line between PA and MD also known as the Mason-Dixon line?
I’m currently selling carbon offsets. All procedes go directly to buying land in central america. Only one house,the care-takers... mine, will be allowed on the property.
The Mason-Dixon line was relocated to the median of Virginia’s Interstate 64 earlier this year. :-)
This is the next bubble.
All the power companies should shut down the power plants and erect a billboard in front of their enterances saying “GO TO HELL”
Didn’t Mason-Dixon get married when Maryland passed their queers get married law?
By their own definition, a successful auction of CO2 allowances means they were unsuccessful.
A success would have been a failure to sell allowances because there isn't any CO2 being emitted.
Blue Point to help China firms expand in U.S.
Fri Dec 26, 2008 ] By Samuel Shen and Pilly Zou
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - U.S. private equity fund Blue Point Capital Partners, which helps mid-sized firms in the United States invest in China, is eyeing new opportunities to help Chinese companies invest abroad, its Asia managing director said.
With U.S. companies cash-strapped by frozen credit markets, private equity firms such as Blue Point are changing strategy.
Blue Point aims to spend a quarter of its newly-raised, $400 million fund in China, helping local manufactures acquire U.S. companies, Chip Chaikin said in an interview in Shanghai.
“A couple of years ago, private companies in China weren’t ready to do it. Now, they recognize they need to grow somewhere else too, and they are more sophisticated and bigger,” he said.
“Entrepreneurs in China have a once-in-a-life-time chance to buy overseas technology, brand, market channels at a bargain.”
Blue Point, 3i Group Plc (III.L) and other private equity firms are suffering from the impact of a deepening global credit and economic crisis that has hurt the value of their investments and made exiting more difficult.
Blue Point has previously funded China expansion by five U.S. companies, including auto parts maker QSR and architectural & design firm Callison Architecture, but now, many U.S. companies are too cash-strapped to expand overseas.
“If they have cash, they want to do it. China is the only place they can grow,” Chaikin said. “But most of them don’t have cash.”
Meanwhile, Chinese companies are more eager to buy assets abroad, as an appreciating yuan makes overseas acquisitions cheaper, and the government calls for a change in China’s growth model, which relies too much on low-cost manufacturing.
“Many Chinese manufactures are at the bottom of the global industry value chain, struggling with thin margins,” said Chen Xiaoming, director of Blue Point Asia.
“We could help them climb up the value chain, by acquiring overseas brands and sales channels.”
Blue Point seeks to invest $15 million to $50 million of equity capital in mid-sized companies which generate revenue of between $25 million and $250 million, according to its website.
The 18-year-old firm set up an office in Shanghai in 2004, to help its U.S. portfolio companies tap growth opportunities in China, the world’s fastest-growing major economy.
(Editing by Jacqueline Wong)
U.S. coal producers increasingly find it more profitable to export their product:
With the falling dollar, selling to Asia, Europe or South America is giving coal producers a higher return than selling into the United States. “If I were running a coal company and I looked at what’s happening on Capitol Hill and the states, I’d be very inclined to send my marketing team overseas,” said Michael Morris, AEP chairman, president and CEO. “That’s where it appears the growth market is going to be, not here domestically.”
In 2007, the United States exported almost 60 million tons of coal. This year, many expect that figure to be between 80 and 90 million tons. Estimates for 2009 are even higher at 100 million tons. Through June of this year, producers sent 40.4 million tons overseas, up 57 percent from 2007.
In particular, note this:
Utah, Colorado and PRB coals are also traveling further and, recently, are being shipped in increasing amounts to the West Coast for deep-pocketed Asian customers.
As Ted Nace points out (via email), much of the Western coal in question is mined on leased public land. The federal coal leasing program rents out that land at $3 an acre with a royalty of “12% of the gross value of the coal produced.”
To translate that to English: American taxpayers are subsidizing coal being sent to China to be burnt in dirty coal plants and fry the planet.
There’s plenty of legitimate debate over how best to mitigate climate change, but surely everyone can agree on this initial strategy: stop subsidizing it.
Low LOW LOW PRICES on TONS OF CARBON!!!
...mitigate climate change? No amount of money is going to change the activity of the sun. Will this hoax ever get over itself?
Positive proof science education was woefully lacking 10-15 years ago.
Never assume these are mutually exclusive options when we are talking about politicians -- thief AND fool would be more likely.
What do they have to sell? What is the actual product or service that is being sold or passed to the buyer?
I read the whole thing and didn’t understand what they sold either.
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