Global CEOs back greenhouse gas cuts

05-27-2009 | AP

CEOs propose setting limits to make CO2 a scarcer commodity

Panama Star COPENHAGEN. A global summit of business leaders urged governments to order steep and mandatory cuts in greenhouse gases Tuesday, favoring a cap-and-trade system instead of a tax to set a market price for carbon waste.

The strong consensus among the 500 CEOs and other top business experts attending the World Business Summit on Climate Change added momentum to prospects of forging a new UN climate treaty in six months.

Leaders agreed at the end of the three-day conference on the need for "immediate and substantial" emission cuts by 2020, based on the best science available, followed by cuts of "at least half of 1990 levels by 2050."

The statement was delivered to Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen and UN climate chief Yvo de Boer. "Your words are sweet music in my ears," Loekke Rasmussen told participants.

The strong consensus among 500 business leaders was that governments should use a cap-and-trade mechanism to set a market price on carbon, rather than imposing a tax.

The conference discussed ways to force consumers to pay for the true environmental costs of things by setting up a globally accepted carbon market — far larger than some that now exist. Its function would be to artificially limit emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and other major industrial gases that scientists say are contributing to rising sea levels, melting glaciers and severe droughts.

If governments agree to set new limits to make carbon dioxide a scarcer commodity, CEOs said, their companies can lead the way to a greener economy by getting permits that divvy up how much pollution they can emit.