As federal lawmakers work to set greenhouse gas reduction goals, the Nicholas Institute has introduced a major new guide for farmers, foresters and investors interested in profiting from the carbon markets that will likely be part of the reduction strategy.  The guide, entitled "Harnessing Farms and Forests in the Low-Carbon Economy: How to Create and Verify Greenhouse Gas Offsets" will be available in June from Duke University Press.  It explains how changes in land use and farming practices can help convert forests' and farms' carbon storage capacity and methane gas reductions into verifiable revenue-generating greenhouse gas offsets that can be bought or sold in greenhouse gas emissions markets.

To order the guide, go to www.dukepress.edu.

A Nicholas Institute study finds that the capture of CO2 emissions from North Carolina coal utilities may be economically feasible if the emissions are piped out of state to underground storage reservoirs in the Gulf Coast and Appalachian Basin regions. "This study shows that even states like North Carolina that are geologically poor for carbon sequestration can plan for a carbon-constrained future for new coal plants," says lead author Eric l. Williams, project director for economic analysis. Other states and regions seeking emissions-reduction opportunities can apply elements of his analysis, he stressed. Williams' 30-page working paper, complete with lifetime cost analyses for carbon capture through supercritical pulverized coal (SPC) versus integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) technologies, is online here. 

Interested in learning more about what's happening on the front lines of environmental science and policy? Check out "Nicholas Talks," a new online collection of recorded talks and presentations by some of the world's top scientists, conservationists and environmental policy analysts. The collection features interesting, nontechnical talks on timely topics like biodiversity, fisheries bycatch, deforestation and sustainable agriculture. New lectures will be added regularly throughout the year, so keep checking back. Downloadable mp3 files of the talks are online here.

One of the major obstacles to setting mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions is the impact such limits may have on U.S. competitiveness in the global economy.  Duke law professor Joost Pauwelyn addresses these concerns and examines the extent to which federal climate policy could alleviate them in a recently published Nicholas Institute working paper, "U.S. Federal Climate Policy and Competitiveness Concerns: The Limits and Options of International Trade Law."  In particular, Pauwelyn assesses the limits imposed by World Trade Organization agreements on possible competitiveness provisions in future climate legislation. The paper is online here. 

A consensus report is now available from the Nicholas Institute's September 2006 round table, "For Security's Sake: Can the United States Help Petroleum Rich Nations Avoid the Resource Curse?"  The report helps illuminate the other side of energy security: the need to address corruption and other problems that cause poverty, unrest and security-threatening instability in oil-rich nations. The 27-page document contains an executive summary of the key policy recommendations made by the round table's 30 experts as well as detailed case studies that explore the implications of the resource curse on U.S.-China relations, and on economic and political stability in developing petroleum-rich nations such as Algeria and Kazakhstan. It's online here.