More than 300 businesses, environmentalists and community groups in 10 Northeast states urged governors to adopt tougher targets for power plant greenhouse gas emissions under the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a cap-and-trade program, reports Maria Gallucci at InsideClimate News. Their goal is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 20 percent by 2020, doubling the current requirement. This would bring more economic growth to the area, they said Most states have devoted nearly all their RGGI money to clean energy growth and energy-use reduction. Under the program, power plants pay for every ton of CO2 they emit by buying pollution allowances from states in quarterly auctions. In the past 4 years, the program generated nearly a billion dollars in auctions, spurring over 1.5 billion dollars in economic benefits and 16,000 new jobs, according to a recent independent analysis. A coalition member said the message to all the governors is simple: “RGGI is important, RGGI is succeeding and it needs to be improved. We really just want to show them there is broad political support for taking those necessary steps.”
Broad Coalition Presses for Tougher Greenhouse Gas Targets Under RGGI Posted: 09 Aug 2012 07:00 AM PDT (Maria Gallucci, InsideClimate News) http://insideclimatenews.org/breaking-news/20120809/regional-greenhouse-gas-initiative-rggi-new-jersey-greenhouse-gas-emissions-targets-environment-northeast?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+solveclimate%2Fblog+%28InsideClimate+News%29
