California has just adopted a “cap-and-trade” system to cap greenhouse gases.
Sooner or later, Hawai‘i will also need to address the problem of the greenhouse gases emitted by our electric utilities. They emit greenhouse gases whether they burn fossil fuel or biofuel.
Geothermal power emits no greenhouse gases.
From Global Finance:
California Scheduled To Adopt Cap-And-Trade Rules
By Cassandra Sweet Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
SAN FRANCISCO -(Dow Jones)-California regulators are scheduled Thursday to adopt the nation’s first large-scale cap-and-trade program for greenhouse-gas emissions as part of the state’s four-year-old climate law.
Under the proposed rules, scheduled to start in 2012, the state Air Resources Board would place a limit, or cap, on greenhouse-gas emissions for the state that would decline over time. Power plants, refineries and other industrial facilities that emit carbon dioxide and can’t cut their emissions by the required amount could obtain pollution allowances from the state or buy them from other emitters with excess allowances…. Read the rest here