Environmental Protection Through Cap-And-Trade

"The eco-capitalists are coming, and they aren't wielding Thoreauvian platitudes about the sanctity of nature. Their jargon is far less lyrical: ecological assets, environmental markets, ecosystem services, natural capital. For these guys, biofuels and long-lasting lightbulbs are fine but they're nothing more than a short-term play. The real money is in nascent markets indexed to the health of Mother Nature."

"People understand the economic value of nature's goods because we constantly pay for them: seafood, timber, copper, cut flowers, natural gas. But nature also provides services that stabilize spaceship Earth. Insects pollinate crops, wooded hillsides purify water, trees sequester CO2, and wetlands buffer cities against storm surges. How much are those services worth? Who knows. They've always been free, or treated as such. Nature has never submitted an invoice."

"Speculators are betting that successful trading of carbon will kick-start the creation of other cap-and-trade systems for ecological services like watershed protection, biodiversity, and erosion control. But it's more complicated than it sounds."