cap and trade: 1/5 of 5

Quebec to beat California in setting up first carbon market in North America

Henry Gass

20th July, 2011

Quebec is set to bring in North America’s first cap-and-trade system from January 2012. But debate still rages about its usefulness more...

Australia ditches carbon trading plans

Ecologist

27th April, 2010

Carbon trading plans were opposed by conservative politicians and criticised by environmental groups for containing loopholes for industry more...

A toothless cap-and-trade scheme is a planetary wrecking ball

Alison Smith

10th December, 2009

The theory of cap-and-trade is brilliantly simple; in practice, however, it's just not moving fast enough, says Alison Smith. A runner-up in the Ecologist/nef essay competition... more...

Life and debt

Molly Scott Cato

23rd April, 2009

This budget season, and so a short perambulation around the vexed question of the national debt seems in order. As a nation we've been living with debt for more the 300 years now, since 1694 to be precise, when Scottish privateer William Paterson persuaded the government of the time that creating £1.2 million of IOUs would get them out of their spending difficulties. more...

How to be free: The last untapped resource

Tom Hodgkinson

1st April, 2008

Sometimes it’s good to take a peep at what the enemy is up to. I spent last weekend reading the New York Herald Tribune, and I’ll sometimes look at The Economist. Both these publications are excellent in their way – the Tribune is far superior in writing and information to The Times, for example – but essentially feed the greed of a business-minded readership anxious to figure out what is going on in the world, the better to profit from it. more...