The Real Cost of Carbon

Abstract

The major mechanism to control emissions is to set a price on greenhouse gases that both encourages energy efficiency and investment in low-energy systems, but also stimulates the development of low-carbon technologies. In this chapter we explore how the price is fixed and how this is implemented.

Homework!

If you have completed all carbon footprinting exercises in Chap. 5 then well done. What I want you to examine is how much it will cost to offset your own or family footprint in terms of trading against the EUA price of €7.11 and using the charcoal standard of €104?

How many trees would that be equivalent to each year? As a guide one broad leaf tree grown in Ireland or the UK would adsorb 1 tonne of CO₂ over 80–100 years. So if you are emitting 5 tonnes of CO₂ per year then you will need to plant five broad leaf trees and maintain it for 100 years just to cover what you emitted this year. In fact you need to multiply 5 by 1.5 to take into account the long term effects of the GHGs over a 100 year period. So to be precise you need to plant 5 times 1.5 which makes 7.5 trees this year. So after 10 years you will have to be managing 75 trees for between 90 and 100 years, after 20 years that will be 150 trees for between 80 and 100 years and that is just for your personal primary emissions!