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Four US states have expressed interest in joining WCI, says Quebec’s Heurtel

Four US states have expressed interest in joining the WCI emissions trading programme, Quebec’s environment minister told Carbon Pulse on Wednesday, which would more than double the scheme’s current membership while potentially bringing a merger between North America’s two carbon markets a step closer.

World Bank CO2 pricing support group’s to-do list: allay corporate discord, help isolated govts, and tackle other “thorny” issues

The main objective of the World Bank’s new high-level Carbon Pricing Leadership Coalition (CPLC), according to the institution’s top climate change official, is to act as a support group for governments and companies that back assigning a cost to greenhouse gas emissions.

COP-21 Roundup: Dec. 2 – Day 3

As delegates at the UN climate talks in Paris get into the details of the new climate change agreement text in search of progress, Carbon Pulse continues to publish updates throughout the day of key developments in the negotiations as well as on the sidelines.

New pollution regulations to cut China’s CO2 emissions 180 mt/year by 2020

China has introduced new coal plant efficiency standards in a bid to curb local air pollution, which will cut CO2 emissions 180 million tonnes by 2020 as a side effect, state-owned Xinhua news agency reported Wednesday.

Voluntary market data from CTX for Dec. 2, 2015

A table of Verified Emission Reduction (VER) prices and offered volumes, based on voluntary market data from Carbon Trade Exchange.

Bite-sized updates from around the world:

The richest 10% of people produce half of Earth’s climate-harming fossil-fuel emissions, while the poorest half contribute a mere 10%, British charity Oxfam said in a report. The campaigners said these emitters should be held accountable, no matter whether they live, referring to many billionaires that live in emerging economies. (AFP/Guardian)

With the UK’s recent cut in CCS funding, the Netherlands might be home to the EU’s best hope for a large-scale CCS project. Consultancy Ecofys has put out a paper listing short-term actions to accelerate the development of CCS in the Netherlands.

Former NASA climate scientist James Hansen tells the Paris climate talks that emissions trading won’t work, but his long-touted border-adjusted carbon fee will. (Phys.org)

Tesla CEO Elon Musk was also in town, calling in no uncertain terms for a carbon tax to counter the “worldwide subsidy that’s contributing to global warming and preventing humanity from freeing itself from the fossil fuel era”. (Business Insider)

And finally… Attention offset project developers: a fast-growing Chinese type of grass known as “lyu xin” (green heart) could soon become a welcome addition to the world’s arsenal in the war against climate change, Xinhua reports.  The grass, similar in appearance to sugarcane or sorghum, can grow five meters in two months, and a hectare of the stuff can absorb up to 200 tonnes of CO2 per year, compared to around 15 hectares for trees.  Lyu xin can withstand high temperatures and drought, can survive in poor soil conditions, regrows rapidly after being cut, and can be ground and processed into products like paper, construction materials and fertilizers.  The only problem, as one might expect from the above description, is the grass would likely be an invasive species if not managed properly.

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