You can't get there from here: Fair, global carbon prices at risk?

Ask most people who follow the clean energy and low-carbon technology markets, and you’ll hear a common refrain: Without a standard price on carbon dioxide emissions that fairly reflects true environmental costs, we don’t have a prayer of building a green global economy anytime soon.

The most recent warning to that effect came today from WWF-UK and The Cooperative Financial Services, which together released a report titled, “Toxic fuels, toxic investments: Why we need mandatory greenhouse gas reporting.” The report finds that today’s lack of carbon reporting requirements is allowing oil and gas companies to invest heavily in high-carbon energy developments such as Canada’s tar sands without having to disclose potential future risks to investors.

“Emitting carbon dioxide will become more and more expensive in the future, as regulation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is progressively tightened up,” the report’s executive summary states. “Yet oil and gas companies are not disclosing to investors the potentially huge costs they will have to pay in order to continue emitting massive amounts of CO2 and other GHGs in the future … The failure of companies to measure and disclose their exposure to future carbon costs obscures the risk associated with high-carbon investments, and contributes to a misallocation of resources.”

And that’s in the UK, which falls under the EU’s Emission Trading Scheme that is at least trying to establish a baseline price for carbon pollution. Such is not the case with top polluters China — which is talking about implementing “half-mandatory” carbon trading by 2014 — and the US, where the much-vaunted hope for a climate bill before this November’s mid-term elections has withered into a resounding “Nope.”

Such developments in the world’s number-one and number-two carbon emitting countries threaten existing carbon markets that are already struggling in the ongoing shaky economy. With EU carbon prices at record lows, carbon brokers are losing their jobs left and right.

Could this be a precursor to the first death rattles for carbon trading? Energy analyst/investment advisor Chris Nelder seems to think so, warning that the carbon emissions legislation game is one that “cannot be won.” His solution? For the US, anyway, he believes the answer lies with a comprehensive energy plan that incorporates all energy sources, phases in an increasing proportion of renewables and makes the most of “every last BTU.”

But is that realistic? Can we really transition from fossil fuels to clean energy using the approach of carrots for renewables versus sticks for oil, gas and coal? And can we do it in a reasonable time frame that addresses both declining fossil fuel reserves and accelerating climate change?

Where do you place your bets? Let us know.