Just a few years ago, sports stadiums were arguably the least green places on the planet. Now many stadiums have become models of sustainability, especially in our region. Today we'll explore that turnaround by taking a closer look at some fields of sustainable dreams. Since baseball season is just getting under way, we'll start with the Seattle Mariners' green haven, Safeco Field.
Friday, April 6, 2012
Sports stadiums blossom into sustainability champs
Just a few years ago, sports stadiums were arguably the least green places on the planet. Now many stadiums have become models of sustainability, especially in our region. Today we'll explore that turnaround by taking a closer look at some fields of sustainable dreams. Since baseball season is just getting under way, we'll start with the Seattle Mariners' green haven, Safeco Field.
Fresh Finance, More EU Uptake, and New Data: The Month in Forest Carbon
Ecosystem Marketplace has now formally closed its collection of data for the State of the Forest Carbon Markets 2012 report. We are grateful to those projects that provided us with complete responses - every respondent is featured at least once on the Forest Carbon Portal homepage now through the end of May. If you did not respond to the survey during the open call for information and would still like to contribute (and be recognized), please contact Molly Peters-Stanley in our Carbon Program to find out how. And on to the latest forest carbon news, where below we summarize how one industry organization is taking an active role in seeking guidance for how to treat forest carbon offsets on a balance sheet in the US, while EU member states consider adding cropland, grazing land, and forest carbon emissions to their national GHG accounts.
California Lawsuit Challenges Foundation of Next-Stage Carbon Offsets
Last week, two new challenges came into view for the carbon offsets program that underlies the United States’ first economy-wide GHG cap-and-trade program. Shortly after the California Air Resources Board announced it would delay the program’s first allowance auction, another first emerged – the first of perhaps many legal challenges to the ARB’s offset program design, and a challenge with implications for emerging offset programs around the world. At issue is whether the ARB’s so-called “performance-based” approach to generating offsets creates an incentive for people to reduce emissions or whether it just pays a bonus to people who would have reduced emissions anyway. The performance-based approach was pioneered in the voluntary carbon market and requires just one protocol for all projects of a certain type – as opposed to the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), which requires the development of individual protocols for unique project scenarios.
UK seeds impact investment bank with £600m
The UK government has launched a £600 million ($949 million) finance institution to lend money to charities and community groups, of which an undisclosed amount will go to environmental organisations.
Big Society Capital will use cash from bank accounts that have been dormant for more than 15 years to grow Britain’s social investment market. In addition, Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group and RBS have agreed to invest £50 million each in the fund.
The End of Coal-Fired Electricity?
By some reports (see here and here), the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's proposed new carbon pollution rule heralds in the new age of natural gas while sounding the death knell for coal-fired power plants. After all, the rule sets limits on emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) from new power plants in line with emissions rates from modern, combined-cycle natural gas plants but far lower than anything today's standard coal-fired plant can achieve. Among the many critics of the rule was the National Mining Association's chief executive and president, Hal Quinn, who stated that the proposed "standards would deliberately push America to abandon coal, its most abundant and reliable energy source in favor of costlier fuels."
Carbon prices tumble to record low
Carbon prices fell to a record low on Monday after the release of official data showing a bigger than expected drop in the amount of pollution emitted by power plants and factories in the European Union’s emissions trading system last year. Benchmark EU carbon prices dropped to €6.14 a tonne – nearly 14 per cent down from the previous day’s close – after preliminary European Commission figures showed that carbon dioxide emissions in 2011 were about 2.4 per cent lower than in the previous year.
Carbon Markets "Massively Oversupplied"
The value of the world’s carbon markets declined by 21 percent over the last quarter, despite trading volumes above the historical average, according to analysis from Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Global carbon markets fell to €14.2bn ($19.2bn) over Q1 2012, according to Bloomberg. This was 41 percent less than in the same period a year ago. UBS carbon analyst Per Lekander told the Financial Times that the figures were worse than the markets expected, describing markets as “massively oversupplied.”
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