Environmental▼News devoted to the Climate VISION in the spring, she says. President Bush announced the 18% intensity target while introducing his global climate change plan last year, which provides $4.6 billion over five years to fund research in renewable energy, clean coal technology, fuel efficiency, carbon sequestration, and hydrogen fuel cells, among other areas (see budget stories starting page 128A). With Climate VISION, Dobrianski says, companies will gain experience in reducing greenhouse gas emissions while researching technology advancements that she says hold the real keys to climate stabilization.
Environmental groups are generally critical of the president’s climate change plan, in part because the 18% intensity reduction target is pegged to economic growth and allows actual emissions to increase substantially. Annual greenhouse gas emissions under the plan could be 130 million metric tons greater in 2012 than they are now, according to DOE’s Energy Information Administration. On the other hand, mandatory reductions under the Kyoto Protocol would have reduced U.S. annual emissions by 321 million tons over the same period. Bush administration officials argue that reductions based on in-
tensity don’t compromise economic growth, while allowing for investments in climate control technologies. However, critics charge that absolute emissions reductions are not necessarily harmful to the economy. “There’s nothing wrong with basing reductions on intensity as long as the reductions are real,” says Eileen Claussen, director of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. “Energy efficiency can both strengthen the economy and help to stabilize climate. The issue here is whether the intensity target is good enough. And the president’s target is an emissions growth target.” —CHARLIE SCHMIDT
Trading in greenhouse gases
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dited, Sandor says. “The whole purpose of being The first voluntary cap-and-trade issued a four-year stream of tradtransparent and regulated by an enprogram for reducing and trading able emission allowances equal to tity like the National Association of greenhouse gas emissions in the their declining emissions budgets, Securities Dealers [the regulator of United States should see its first says Mike Walsh, CCX senior vice NASDAQ] and having independent trade this spring. The Chicago president. They can also receive verification and monitoring is to Climate Exchange (CCX) announced credits, or offsets, for programs such create credibility and allow for the in January that 14 of the country’s as reforestation projects in Brazil, possibility of linking up with other largest companies had signed up, and landfill methane recapture or schemes,” Sandor adds. The United with a second round due to be ancustomer-based energy efficiency Kingdom and Denmark already nounced in the next few months. schemes. Offset projects in Canada have schemes, and the EU plans CCX’s members, into start a transnational scheme in 2005. cluding American Electric Participating in CCX Power (AEP), Dupont, and is a “natural next step” Ford Motor Co. each made after the successful expericommitments to reduce ence of trading acid rainby 2006 their emissions of causing emissions, says greenhouse gases, by 4% below the average of their Dale Heydlauff, senior 1998–2001 baseline. The vice president of AEP, the gases included are CO2, largest electricity generaCH4, N2O, fluorocarbons, tor in the United States. and SF6. The response “The market-based apfrom companies has been proach has produced SO2 “overwhelming”, says reductions faster, cheaper, U.S. companies are showing overwhelming interest in greenRichard Sandor, CCX’s and deeper than predicthouse gas emissions trading, CCX’s Sandor says. chair. The first 14 memed,” he says. Through its bers to join account for CCX commitment, AEP half of the United Kingdom’s emisand Mexico will be added during expects to reduce or offset an sions of CO2, he says, adding that the year. Participants can also reestimated 18 million tons of CO2 participants expect to expand the ceive partial credits based on past emissions, and AEP officials expect program after the first year. reductions undertaken in the midthe company to be a net buyer of CCX will provide a trading sys1990s under the Clinton administracredits. tem for members to buy and sell tion’s voluntary reduction program, Participants view CCX as a policredits. There will be a central regafter verification by CCX. cy experiment and hope lessons istry, which will serve as an official CCX has developed methods for learned from it will encourage the holder of trades, linked to an elecequating the benefits produced by government to create a markettronic trading platform on which all reforestation projects to credits, based reduction program, if the trades will occur. Members will be which would be independently auUnited States decides to control 124 A ■ ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY / APRIL 1, 2003
tisan research group, agrees. “There are always problems when reductions under the cap [or emission limits set by the program] are shifted to emissions outside the cap.” Offset projects add another challenge because there is no obvious baseline for giving credits, he says. “I do not believe that voluntary programs can achieve significant emission reductions, that is, reductions that entail significant costs,” Pizer adds. “Of course, there might well be some cheap reductions lying around out there. In a competitive world, how can a company spend anything other than [public relations funds] on something that its competitors are not doing?” He also doubts the liquidity of a market with only 14 players and suggests that trading would be very modest. For information on CCX, visit www.chicagoclimateexchange.com. —MARIA BURKE
Making sense of toxicogenomics data Although the emerging field of toxicogenomics—the study of how genes respond to environmental toxicants or stressors—could answer many questions that have plagued chemical risk assessments, such as determining the minimum dose that causes a health effect and evaluating risks from mixtures, significant issues still need to be resolved before the regulatory community is willing to embrace this new technology. To help the U.S. federal government overcome some of the hurdles in using toxicogenomics information, the National Research Council (NRC) has formed a Committee on Emerging Issues and Data on Environmental Contaminants, which will provide a public forum for stakeholders to discuss issues in environmental toxicology, risk assessment, exposure assessment, toxicogenomics, and other related fields over the next five years. The committee will not prepare reports but may recommend topics for future NRC workshops and studies. At its second public meeting, held February 6, much of the time was
devoted to one of the biggest challenges in toxicogenomics—making sense of the tremendous variability in data that have been generated so far by different laboratories, so that the data can be easily compared and compiled into a central database. According to Brenda Weis, program coordinator for extramural toxicogenomics research at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), researchers are using many different types of microarrays, which are tiny glass or plastic chips that contain thousands of genes, to quantify which genes are turned “on” or “off” by exposure to a particular chemical. Some research groups are using commercially available microarrays, while others have their own custom-designed platforms, she says. Not all of these platforms contain the same number of genes, and the genes are not always in the same place in the ordered arrays, she adds. In addition, there are no standard protocols. To make matters even more complicated, there are often inconsistencies in gene expression data generated by the same laboratory
News Briefs UNEP mercury report Worldwide mercury pollution could be significantly reduced by curbing emissions from power stations, concludes a report from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Coal-fired plants and waste incinerators account for approximately 1500 tons, or 70%, of new anthropogenic mercury emissions, and most of that comes from developing countries. At 860 tons, emissions from Asia are the highest, the researchers found. The report was considered during UNEP’s Governing Council meeting in February on global action to control mercury emissions (Environ. Sci. Technol. 2003, 36, 441A). Global Mercury Assessment: UNEP Chemicals is at www.unep. org/GoverningBodies.
Other GHGs To cost-effectively tackle climate change, climate policies must extend beyond CO2 and address all of the greenhouse gases (GHGs), according to a report by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, a nonprofit research group. The authors cite that over the past century, the total effect of all other GHGs, including banned chlorofluorocarbons, is roughly equal to CO2’s influence on climate change. The report acknowledges that CO2 is an important GHG and its ties to fossil fuel emissions make for simple estimates. However, capabilities to measure and assess aerosols, related pollutants like SOx and CO, and other GHGs have improved. Multi-Gas Contributors to Global Climate Change: Climate Impacts and Mitigation Costs of Non-CO2 Gases is available at http://pewclimate.org.
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these gases, Heydlauff says. CCX is one way to respond to the Bush administration’s voluntary climate change program, he adds (see story on page 123A). Environmentalists gave a qualified approval to the scheme. “The problem with voluntary schemes is that that there are never enough volunteers,” says David Doniger of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “Ultimately, it needs to be mandatory. But these companies believe that some carbon regulation is inevitable and are trying to get ahead of the curve.” Doniger’s top concern is that the scheme will rely on giving credits for actions taken outside the program, such as reforestation projects in South America or investments in reduction technologies in nonmember companies. Billy Pizer, a fellow in the Quality of the Environment Division of Resources for the Future, a nonpar-
