CoolPass Inc: California may allow a wider variety of offset types in cap-and-trade scheme.

March 15, 2011 - PRLog -- CoolPass sources report that the California Air Resources Board (Carb) has to date approved four protocols for U.S.-based projects as eligible project types. Forest management, urban forestry, livestock and ozone-depleting substances projects have so far been given the green light, but Mary Nichols, chairman of Carb said she intends pushing for more.

“I certainly am hoping we’ll get some additional protocols,” Nichols told CoolPass at the International Emissions Trade Association (Ieta) conference in Washington DC recently.

Nichols is particularly keen on protocols which would benefit the state’s agricultural sector.

“We already have a forestry protocol, but there are several others in the works related to nitrogen fertilizer and cultivation practices in the rice industry and a couple others out there that have been quite well vetted,” the chairman said, adding that they remained hopeful that they would be able to “bring those to the board and make sure we have a larger number of protocols in place.”

Nichols also pointed out that initially she didn’t expect offsets generated from reducing emissions from deforestation and degeneration (Redd) in developing nations to count in the new program.

She added that in the event of Carb failing to agree on additional offset protocols there would still be ample supply to meet demand.

“We’d like to have more because you’d like to have more options for people who want to purchase offsets,” Nichols informed CoolPass.

Analysts expect California’s cap-and trade program to need more than 222 million offset credits by 2020.

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We sell the retirement of carbon offsets on your behalf so that they are removed from circulation forever. By retiring the offsets, CoolPass insures that the underlying CO2 is never traded again and that the result is a positive environmental impact.