Robert Samuelson has an article at Real Clear Politics this morning that hones in on the likely results of a “cap and trade” regime in the United States:

The chief political virtue of cap-and-trade — a complex scheme to reduce greenhouse gases — is its complexity. This allows its environmental supporters to shape public perceptions in essentially deceptive ways. Cap-and-trade would act as a tax, but it’s not described as a tax. It would regulate economic activity, but it’s promoted as a “free market” mechanism. Finally, it would trigger a tidal wave of influence-peddling, as lobbyists scrambled to exploit the system for different industries and localities. This would undermine whatever the system’s abstract advantages.

That been the experience with the EU’s system:

Fights have erupted as countries seek to guard their interests. Eastern European nations have lobbied for more generous allocations because of their communist legacies and lower living standards. Germany, the continent’s largest wind-energy producer, wants an E.U. mandate that each country get 20 percent of its energy from renewable resources by 2020; Poland, which uses no renewable resources, is resisting.

Germany boasts that it has cut emissions to 18.4 percent below 1990 levels, the benchmark used in the Kyoto Protocol and in Europe. But nearly half the reduction was because of sagging industrial output in the former East Germany after reunification. For the 2008-2012 period, E.U. officials sliced 5 percent off Germany’s emissions proposal.

Individual companies have also haggled over whether their historical records were representative emission benchmarks.

“A paper mill in Italy would get different credits from a paper mill in Germany, even if they are completely the same,” said Marco Mensink, energy and environment director of the Confederation of European Paper Industries.

Perversely, Europe’s cap-and-trade system has done little to reduce output at such places as the Janschwalde coal plant, Europe’s third-biggest carbon dioxide emitter. Each year, it spews more than 25 million tons of carbon dioxide. The dirty gray plant still has turbines and generators that date from Soviet times. It has nine cooling towers, and just half of its output can power all of Berlin.

There have been improvements in carbon emissions in Europe (the improvements here without such a system have been greater) but I’ve seen no attempts at disaggregating the effects of cap and trade and other EU policies aimed in that direction from the export of EU manufacturing to China which I believe is the primary cause of reductions in emissions and energy use both in the EU and here.

I have no objection to moves to reduce carbon emissions in principle, particularly moves that would reward greater efficiency. My own preferred policy would be a straightforward carbon tax. Less riggable. But I also think that we’re likely to get more bang for the buck by removing the vast array of government incentives that encourage greater energy consumption generally and greater oil consumption in particular. I have no illusions that such a plan would ever be adopted. Too many of our oxen would be gored.

If the next administration is a Democratic one I expect we’ll see greater moves in the direction of a cap and trade system. Its very complexity tends to be attractive to technocrats. However, with the political constraints that our legislators are feeling these days I think we’ll see even more out-and-out regulation without much in the way of measures to increase enforcement of the regulations. That has the benefit of appearing to be doing something about the problem without incurring the costs of actually doing something about it. Talk as always is cheap.

If the next administration is a Republican one I doubt that much substantive will be done, especially considering today’s Republican Party’s allergy to taxes. We’ll continue to make most of the same mistakes we’re making now.

今天上午，罗伯特萨缪尔森在"Real Clear Politics"上发表的一篇文章，极大的完善了美国的“排放贸易”制度：

这是“排放贸易”制度最主要的政治优点-一个复杂的计划用以减少温室气体-它的复杂性.这使得其环保的支持者，基本上是在以欺骗的方式形成市民的看法.排放贸易将作为税，但它不被形容为税。它将规范经济活动，但同时它作为一个“自由市场”的机制被推广。 最后，它会引起海啸式的影响-说客争相利用该系统对不同行业和地区的规定进行推销。这将破坏该系统的理论优势。

这一直是欧盟制度的经验：

因为国家寻求防范他们的利益而导致打斗爆发。而东欧国家游说是为了更慷慨的分配，因为他们的共产主义遗留思想和较低的生活水平。

德国，欧洲大陆最大的风力能源的生产者，希望欧盟的任务是到2020年，每个国家能获得20 ％的来自可再生资源的能源，波兰，它却抵制这种做法，没有使用可再生资源。德国自夸它已削减排放量的18.4 ％，低于用于京都协议书和欧洲的1990年的基准水平，

但实质上德国有将近一半的减少是因为在前东德统一后工业产值低靡。， 欧盟官员提出关于在2008-2012年间削减德国5 ％排放量的建议。

个体公司也争论代表的废气排放基准是否超过了他们的历史纪录，

“造纸厂在意大利和造纸厂在德国会得到不同的贷款，即使他们是完全一样的”，欧洲造纸工业的邦联能源和环境署署长马曼思克说。

相反的，欧洲的排放贸易体制在像减少janschwalde煤电厂的排出方面做的很少，它是欧洲的第三大二氧化碳排放源。每年，它喷出超过25万吨的二氧化碳，肮脏的灰色车间仍然有苏联时代的涡轮机和发电机，它有9个冷却塔，只需一半的输出产量可以相当于柏林所有的二氧化碳喷出量。

碳排放量在欧洲已有所改善（在缺少这样一个系统的情况下改善是非常重要的），但我见到它对分解排放贸易的影响没有作用，其他欧盟政策的目的是在这一方向上出口欧盟制造业到中国，我相信这是排放量减少和能源在欧盟和在这里的使用的首要原因。

在原则上，我对减少二氧化碳排放量的行为并无异议，尤其是奖励提高工作效率的行为。我自己偏好的政策就是采取一个简单的碳税。少非法操纵. 但我也认为我们很可能获得更多的重击通过推卸责任，撤消大量的政府奖励措施，鼓励更多的能源消耗和更大的石油消费量，特别是，我幻想着认为这样的一个计划，在任何时候都将获得通过。太多，我们会有冲突。

如果下一届政府是一个民主的政府，我期望我们将能看到在排放贸易体制方面有更大的举动。其非常复杂，往往吸引着科技工作者。然而，随着政治上的限制，这些天来，我们的立法者，我认为他们都感到了我们将看到更地地道道的规例，在没有多大措施的途径上，以增加有关规例的执行。实际上，在没有对成本做一些事情时，似乎对这个问题做一些事是有好处的，不过如果是谈的话当然是很容易的。

如果下一届政府是一个共和党政府，我猜想会有很多实质性工作要做，尤其是考虑到现在的共和党对税的过敏性。我们将继续犯现在我们正在犯的同样错误中的大部分错误。

见前面

我猜想，从专业的政治家的角度来看，最后这一点可能是排放贸易计划的最大好处，尤其对于开发工程管理系统。毕竟，石油和煤炭现在比开发工程管理系统更有可能送钱给共和党. 在最初几年后，这可能会改变，更不用说这将创造所有其他影响推销的可能性。并请注意，我不是特地指那些代表（尤其不是目前的民选官员）以上的机电工程署署长。他们由不同的游说买和支付。如果排放贸易成为现实，他们会适应这种制度。

它是一项功能，而非缺陷。

目前，美国对散布污染物质者有排放贸易体制，我不认为他们已经有上文所述的最坏的情况下的影响的任何一点。该系统的自由市场者倡导以单纯的指挥和控制条例作为首选， （您将只能排放z微米的K物质或证明给我们您用以减少K物质的排放量所使用的最好的技术）。

我想申明两点：

市场的创造不是成本全免的。在伊利诺斯州，我相信政府的成本是通过那些排放者的申请费来实现的。有些人可能称之为税。

第二，复杂的附带成本。最近，在伊利诺斯州我已经表示，政府给予一个新的清洁空气法案许可证的过程将需时3至5年，。并非所有都归咎于排放量贸易（或许只有一点点可以），但它不断恶化，任务也随之不断增加。