According to Bloomberg, the European Union isn’t going to meet the emissions standards of the Kyoto Protocol. It seems that tradable pollution credits made a lot of people rich—including hedge funds and investment banks who traded the credits—but didn’t do much to encourage emission reduction.
When European Union officials created a market for trading pollution credits, they boasted it was a “cost-conscious way” to save the planet from global warming.Five years later, the 25-nation EU is failing to meet the Kyoto Protocol's carbon-dioxide emission standards. Rather than help protect the environment, the trading system has led to increases in electricity prices of more than 50 percent and record profits for RWE AG and other utilities.
Fortunately, we don't have to worry too much about those European polluters because global warming stopped in 1998.
Europe Fails Kyoto Standards as Trading Scheme Helps Polluters [Bloomberg]
