Ronald Bailey Asks Which Cuts Greenhouse Gases More: Carbon Markets or Recessions?
A new study provides the answer.
The non-profit Climate Group recently hailed the European Union's carbon market, known as the Emissions Trading Scheme, for having "achieved many bold results." Launched in 2005, the ETS aimed to reduce member states' carbon dioxide emissions by putting a price on them. Under the United Nations' Kyoto Protocol, the European Union agreed that by 2012, it would cut its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 8 percent below the levels emitted in 1990. In 2012, the E.U. announced that it had reached that goal. But was the ETS chiefly responsible for the GHG reductions? Reason Science Correspondent Ronald Bailey parses a new study that finds that the answer is a definite, no.