Greenbacks for being green

As carbon emissions increase and the economy declines, the stock market isn’t the only place doing trading these days. Carbon credits are traded among power plants and industries as part of a regulatory scheme to lower greenhouse-gas emissions. One carbon credit is roughly equivalent to one ton of carbon dioxide that would be released into the environment.

Adirondack forests store a huge amount of carbon.

Carbon credits can be bought by polluting companies, but they also can be earned if the companies protect forestlands or replant forests that can help filter out the carbon they emit. Every stand of trees that can filter out carbon is a “carbon sink” and can contribute carbon credits to that company.

But as carbon credits were doled out across the North Country and Adirondacks, no one thought to give municipalities credits for the sinks within their borders—until now. In some Adirondack towns, more than 70 percent of the land is in the forever-wild Forest Preserve. In short, the towns are huge carbon sinks. If these carbon sinks had been owned or protected by a power plant, the plant would earn carbon credits.

In an interview with North Country Public Radio, Adirondack Council spokesman John Sheehan suggested that in today’s turbulent economy, perhaps Adirondack towns should be compensated with carbon credits, just as companies are. They could then trade these credits to polluting plants and perhaps boost their local economies. (Click here to listen to the interview.)

In effect, local government could make money off of the policies they’ve been living with for decades, leading me to think that maybe Kermit was wrong: maybe it is easy being green.