Cap and trade wins California Supreme Court ruling

[alp227]

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

Over some environmentalists' objections, the state Supreme Court voted Wednesday to let California air-quality regulators go ahead with a market-oriented cap-and-trade system of pollution credits to combat global warming while appealing a judge's order to look harder at alternatives.

The order came in a case that has divided mainstream environmental groups, which support cap and trade, and antipoverty "environmental justice" organizations, which argue that the market approach exposes poor and minority communities to more pollution.

At issue is the implementation of AB32, California's first-in-the-nation global warming law, which requires the state to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2020.

The state Air Resources Board's chosen strategy is cap and trade, which sets industrywide limits on emissions and reduces them each year through 2020. Businesses that exceed their maximums can buy allowances from other companies, and can also meet their goals through environmentally friendly actions such as planting trees anywhere in the world.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/09/29/BARF1LAT96.DTL

[No Elephants]

1. As Colbert might say, "The market has spoken."