How Cap and trade can pay for national broadband, cyber-infrastructure and distressed mortgages

[Many countries like USA and Australia are following Europe’s lead and planning to deploy national cap and trade systems in order to fight CO2 emissions. Since both presidential candidates in the USA have promised a cap and trade system, a national US cap and trade is likely to be deployed very early in the new presidential mandate.

Few people involved with broadband or cyber-infrastructure understand the potential impact of cap and trade on their operations. Cap and trade can be a significant cost to universities and broadband operators, but it also, paradoxically can be a huge financial opportunity to underwrite the costs of these very important infrastructures.

Telecom is a major consumer of power and emitter of GHG emission (Scope 2). British Telecom, for example, claims they are the largest single power consumer (and hence GHG emitter) in the UK. Australia has recently discovered that new proposed national broadband architecture, using antiquated VDSL technology, will require the energy output of 5 new power plants. A typical university produces somewhere between 200,000 to 500,000 metric tons (mT) of CO2 of which anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 mT can be attributed to campus ICT and cyber-infrastructure.

Cap and trade is essentially a hidden carbon tax. Although there are many complexities to cap and trade, and the details of the US cap and trade are not known, it has the potential to impose a huge financial burden on telecom operators and universities. Initially Australia and USA are likely to have much lower cap price and the impact will be very much dependent at what level they set the “cap” , but over time the cap will be lowered and the price of CO2 that exceeds the cap will rise. Europe next year is proposing to set the price of cap and trade CO2 at $100 per mTon. So do the math people!!! This can have a huge cost on your current operations in terms of increased cost of energy. We are talking millions, if not billions of dollars here.

But as I mentioned earlier, cap and trade (as well as much more efficient carbon taxes) can also be a significant financial opportunity for network operators and university cyber-infrastructure. The dollar amounts being talked about are staggering – trillions of dollars in carbon offsets are expected to exchange hands in the coming years with cap and trade. With this kind of money, not only could you bail out the all the banks in North America, but you could also pay for all sorts of national policy programs like national broadband, healthcare, cyber-infrastructure etc etc.

Chinese entrepreneurs, so far, have been the biggest beneficiaries of cap and trade – last year they earned $7.3 billion dollars in carbon offsets from the European cap and trade system. It baffles me that exalted American entrepreneur is nowhere is to be found in making money from this business!!

Universities and telecom operators need to understand how cap and trade works now. Cyber-infrastructure and broadband are the ONLY technologies where we can achieve significant reductions in our respective carbon footprints at our institutions and networks. But it is imperative that you deploy the right architectures. Point to point home run fiber may be more expensive than VDSL, but its carbon footprint is significantly less. More importantly the cost differential between P2P home run versus VDSL can be easily be paid for through carbon offsets (if not the entire cost of the fiber) because of its smaller footprint. Home run fiber will also enable the new high speed applications like tele-presence, etc that might enable the network operator, or consumer, to earn additional carbon offsets or carbon credits.

Zero carbon data centers, cyber-infrastructure facilities and central offices powered by renewable energy will also enable universities, businesses and telecom operators to earn billions of dollars in carbon offsets. Virtualization, clouds and SOA will be critical to this strategy. To learn more please see these week’s issue of the Economist special feature on corporate IT.

But to earn these valuable dollars you have got to understand the ISO and WRI processes for measuring and accounting for GHG emissions. Simple claims of increased energy efficiency, turning off computers or printers is NOT enough and will not be eligible for carbon offsets. You must plan for a zero carbon architecture if you want to earn valuable carbon offset dollars.

Many economists are starting to recognize that we must help those with distressed mortgages if we are going to quickly recover from this financial crisis (see this week’s Economist Oct 26). Bailing out the banks will not be sufficient to restore confidence in the economy. There are many proposals on how to help those out who face big increases in their mortgages where the value of the house is significantly below that of the mortgage itself. Carbon credits earned from carbon offsets may be one way to address this problem. Home owners would help the planet by reducing their carbon footprint and the extra money spent on heating or transportation because of cap and trade, or carbon tax could be credited to their mortgage account, instead of being sent to the government, or worse Clean Coal. In fact I would suggest that mortgage payments be made directly with the carbon credit where the bank would have to its own carbon reduction in order to convert the credit to real cash. For more details please see http://green-broadband.blogspot.com/2008/09/carbon-credits-instead-of-carbon-taxes.html

What is the biggest obstacle to this future nirvana of carbon offsets through cap and trade? Clean Coal.

The Clean coal coalition will fight tooth and nail to prevent or emasculate cap and trade, as they are the biggest contributors to global warming. One ton of coal produces almost 3 tons of CO2. They are the enemy. As far as I am concerned apologists for clean coal should be hauled up in front the war crimes tribunal in the Hague and be charged with planetary genocide.

For more rants on Clean Coal and global warming as well as detailed information on how to earn carbon offsets please see
http://green-broadband.blogspot.com/

-Bill]