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Big investors urge U.S. goverment to slash greenhouse gas emissions |
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Contributed by Jim Elliott
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Friday, 23 March 2007 |
Dozens of big investors who manage nearly $US 4 trillion dollars in assets have called on the U.S. Congress this week to slash greenhouse gas emissions by up to 90 per cent, joining a growing chorus of countries that are doing their part to reduce or replace current GHG-rich energy supplies with alterniatives.
The Wall Street investment house Merrill Lynch and Calpers, the largest U.S. public pension fund, among others in the investment sector of the U.S. economy have asked their government to cut emissions from tailpipes, smokestacks, coal mines and farms. They are asking for rules aimed at cutting emissions by 60-90 per cent below 1990 levels.
Joining the investment community are some of the largest chemical, energy and insurance companies including DuPont, PG & E, Allianz and BP America. The group said such deep cuts in emissions could avoid worst-case scenarios of climate change. It could head off water shortages for billions of people and crop yield declines that could mean hunger for millions.
President Bush has opposed mandatory caps on heat-trapping gases and pulled the United States out of the Kyoto Accord. But all of the current leading presidential candidates from both parties favour mandatory cuts. Also climate change actions have moved up the list of priorities coming from the Democratic Party.
One effective action taken by the European Union has been a cap and trade market where sectors of the economy would be given a set cap on emissions. Those under utilizing their cap or those that could reduce emissions or gain efficiencies could trade their technology or their part of the cap to another company or sector.
The investment market sees the use of these rules as a way to direct research and investment in actions that would capture and bury carbon dioxide or commodify it so that others could utilize it as a input rather than seeing it as simply a waste.
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Last Updated ( Friday, 23 March 2007 )
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