We didn’t look for this oil change in the world’s economic motor, but it’s happening all the same, and the future will definitely run less smoothly than the past, sorry to say.
Supplies are going down :-
https://www.theoildrum.com/files/ccst20090515.png
And the prices are going up (again) according to this constantly updating chart :-
https://markets.ft.com/tearsheets/performance.asp?s=us@cl.1
Whether or not we believe that Carbon Trading can help us reduce the amount of Carbon Energy we use, we will have to start using less, in real terms, anyway.
The next big question is : why bother with the expense and fuss of Carbon Trading ?
Why create an artificial market to slow down Energy use ? Why not just let the true, unfettered market do its work ?
An undistorted market in the remaining good quality Crude Oil flows will close down Carbon Energy business and radically reduce Transportation and Globalised Trade quite nicely for the purposes of combatting Climate Change.
Whether it will happen fast enough is another matter. Plus, the ride will be very, very bumpy.
I’d rather see a controlled Energy Descent. Let’s have Energy Rationing. And if people really, really insist, let’s have it priced in a Carbon Trade. But don’t think it’s going to last. The Carbon Cap is going to ratchet down so quickly, new Carbon Credits will not be coming to the market in sufficient quantities to satisfy all the market needs.
Sooner or later we need to make real Carbon Reductions. Let’s have strict Carbon Quotas – and forget all this Carbon Market nonsense.