Greenhouse Gas Emissions Offsets from Agriculture: Opportunities and Challenges

Abstract

as the scientific evidence of global climate change continues to accumulate (IPCC, 007) and the predicted impacts of a warming planet become more widely known, national policies and international agreements designed to mitigate global warming have sought to strike a balance between environmental sustainability and economic achievement. Under the 997 Kyoto accord (hereafter “Kyoto”) a global framework for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to pre990 levels was developed that established binding emissions reduction targets and timetables for industrialized countries, and included flexibility provisions intended to reduce the overall cost of emissions reductions. Countries subject to emissions limits were free to decide how to reduce emissions to meet the established targets over the period 008– 0 . Countries could design their own domestic policies to meet their targets. Kyoto’s flexibility provisions allowed cooperation between industrialized countries to achieve emissions reductions through Joint Implementation and included the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) to facilitate cooperation with developing nations that were not subject to binding emissions reductions. Despite the fact that not all countries ratified the 997 agreement, many countries, provinces, and states have, in the time since Kyoto, enacted policies individually or in cooperation to reduce GHG emissions. In addition to binding regulatory approaches taken by governments there has also been at least one similar voluntary initiative undertaken by the private sector in the form of the Chicago Climate exchange. Greenhouse Gas Emissions Offsets from Agriculture: Opportunities and Challenges