Carbon Trading

There has been much discussion in the last few years about carbon dioxide and how to reduce emissions. I don’t want to talk about global warming or similar. To my mind reducing any sort of venting of any sort of waste is a good thing; whatever justification is used.
Australia’s response has been to introduce a framework for trading in carbon dioxide. Companies who vent are charged accordingly but given credits based on various factors (which I admit I have not bothered to understand). These credits can be traded to reduce or eliminate the amount that needs to be paid.
The idea is, of course, to artificially impose a market value on carbon and hence allow the normal economic forces to counter the drive to throw it away. The trouble with this is the unintended consequences which attend almost any attempt to use economic forces to drive anything.
The intended consequence is for the artificial costs of producing CO¬2 to be passed on to the consumer which, in theory will reduce demand. In many areas this will provide incentives for alternatives – even in areas such as power generation. However, there are so many other consequences that I suspect that the dynamics of the situation are likely to change completely. I will leave it to the economists to consider in detail.
However, one major point of concern is that this is an artificial market in carbon. Indeed the market is in a secondary resource – carbon emission credits. I would have thought that a better solution, although considerably more difficult, would be to create a real market in carbon. Who would vent a valuable commodity into the air if it could instead be sold to off-set production costs?
The underlying problem is not with CO2 production per se, but with the fact that it is vented to environment. Indeed this is the case with any pollutant: gaseous, particulate, solid or liquid. They are created because the most efficient industrial processes used to produce the enormous number of consumables we use also create large amounts of waste product as a side-effect. Disposal of the waste products is done in the most cost effective way – which often means just venting because capturing and/or storing them is often more expensive.
The problem here is the classification of substances as ‘waste’. One industry’s waste is another industry’s raw material. The point of carbon trading is to make the CO2 worth something so that it is traded instead of thrown away. But the value created is artificial – imposed by government regulation. But what if the gas had some real and tangible value as a raw material in some other industry?
Actually there are a number of industries whose waste product provides a raw material for some other industry. Connecting these production systems could (does?) provide a lucrative business for some entrepreneur.
This could be a prime area for some basic research – what can CO2 be profitably used for?
I am not an expert in this field and so I cannot answer that question myself but I would have thought that it was a ripe – over ripe – field of inquiry. Is there anyone in the world looking into it? I know it can be used to carbonate drinks, but I suspect that this will not use a great deal of the current world supply. I have heard of mechanisms of using C02 as a purifying agent – say for de-caffeinating coffee. Injected CO2 can be used to greatly enhance the strength of concrete. I can conceive of using it as a fuel or additive in cars – thus reducing petrol consumption at the same time.
CO2 is used to make dry ice – is this something that could be more extensively used in our society? Are there any other properties of the gas which may be useful? Could we fill our greenhouses with it – or at least increase the partial pressure a little (we don’t want to kill those people who work in greenhouses). Are there any medical uses? The possibilities are endless (mostly because I don’t know enough to discard them).
By providing funds to research agencies (most of which are government owned in Australia) to follow this chain of logic is likely to provide greater benefit for less outlay than the current approach. Of course, the approach is not restricted to carbon. Most major industries could profit from creating an alternate market for their own waste material. Even in obscure cases - waste heat from power generation need not be vented, especially when the power is, itself, going to be used to generate heat somewhere else. The trouble is in transporting the waste from the major industrial centres where it is generated to the places where it can profitably be used.
However, that is drifting off topic somewhat and I think I will explore another time.