The Planet - Solutions of Global Warming

Most of the world's energy is derived from fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas. Only about 6 percent comes from nuclear power plants.

But burning fossil fuels emits large amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other gases that trap infrared radiation from the sun.

As a result, say many climatologists, our atmosphere is heating up like the inside of a greenhouse, and unless we reduce the rate of CO2 gas emissions, the temperature of the Earth will increase by as much as 6o F in the next century.

Such global warming, according to worst-case scenarios, will cause disastrous floods, droughts and erratic changes in ocean currents, and even will spread tropical diseases and parasites throughout the planet.

Advocates say that nuclear power will help prevent global warming because nuclear reactors produce virtually no greenhouse gases. They point to France, where about 60 pollution-free power plants provide three-fourths of the country's electricity.

But critics argue that nuclear power is inherently dangerous and prohibitively expensive. They point out that accidents like the 1986 Chernobyl power plant disaster in the former Soviet Union can result in radiation poisoning that lasts many generations.

Opponents also maintain that safely storing radioactive waste is difficult, and that newly designed breeder reactors could make it easier for plutonium fuel to get into the hands of terrorists and others eager to build small-scale nuclear weapons.

Bulgarian energy emits more than 60% of air, soil and water pollutions in our Country. The European Commission is considering imposing an new (2010) EU-wide tax on CO2 emissions on sectors such as transport and agriculture, which are currently not covered by the bloc's cap-and-trade scheme for carbon dioxide.

Background:
Since the early 1990s, there have been several attempts to introduce a unitary carbon tax across all EU member states.

But an EU carbon tax has never materialised, as countries like the UK were unwilling to render national competencies on taxation to Brussels. Moreover, the member states affected worst by the current financial crisis, including Spain and Ireland, argued that they would be hit harder by the tax than more industrialised member states.

Consequently, the EU built its climate policy around an emissions trading scheme, which requires large industrial plants to buy and sell permits to release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Till now EU does not include two key polluting sectors, agriculture and transport, which could be easily covered by a carbon tax.

In an attempt to find more effective ways of regulating carbon emissions and filling the state coffers, countries previously averse to the idea - and most notably France - are now engaged in debating national carbon taxation schemes. The proposed amendment of the 2003 Energy Taxation Directive would oblige member states to levy a CO2 tax on fuels in order to cut emissions.

The Commission reckons that the EU's policy framework has "changed radically" since the adoption of the existing legislation, which it wants to bring in line with the bloc's ambitious climate goals.

The EU executive is now re-addressing the issue after the Swedish EU Presidency put its weight behind it.

The draft suggests that a minimum levy of €0.01 per kilogramme of CO2 could be added to the price of heating fuels like gasoil, kerosene and natural gas. Motor fuels would be taxed either €0.01 or €0.03 per kg/CO2, depending on where they are used.

The EU executive reserves the right to propose higher rates in the event that the EU decides to up its emissions reduction target of 20% below 1990 levels by 2020. The EU has pledged to go to 30% in the event that other industrialised countries follow suit in the framework of a new climate treaty to be negotiated in December.

Member states would have to apply the CO2 taxes starting from 2013, according to the draft document.

The amended directive would address two significant polluting sectors, transport and agriculture, which were originally exempted from having to pay for their emissions. The Commission hopes that taxing the CO2 content of fuels will provide an appropriate CO2 price signal in the transport field.

Carbon prices would be further strengthened under the directive as small installations excluded from emissions trading would have to pay for CO2 as part of their energy consumption.

Promoting biofuels

Biomass would be exempt from CO2 taxation under the directive because it is carbon neutral at end use, the Commission says. Moreover, businesses that make early investments in low-carbon technologies would get transitional exemptions, it added.

However, the industry is worried that a policy of promoting biofuels over all other fuels would disrupt the process of technological development and efficiency gains made in terms of fossil fuel use. Moreover, the simple assumption that biofuels do not produce CO2 is questioned by experts, who point to deforestation as a result of land use changes.

For official carbon dioxide reducing patent publications see here

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