Climate Change: Regulation and Market-Based Climate Solutions
Learning Objectives
Students will understand the relative strengths and weaknesses of regulation and market-based solutions for climate change.
Materials
Homework
- Read "How Regulations Help Fight Climate Change"
- Complete homework handout
Class
- (5 minutes) Review homework, especially the final question about what limitations regulations face as a policy tool.
- (20 minutes) Have students read "What Are Market-Based Solutions for Mitigating Climate Change?" and fill out the graphic organizer in the class handout
- (20 minutes) Lead students through a discussion about regulation and market-based solutions
- First brainstorm as a group what each policy tool is good for, and record responses on the board
- Ask: is one tool better than the other? Why?
- Ask: are there some problems that neither tool can solve? What other tools might be needed?
Homework
Write an op-ed, letter to the editor, or letter to a local official about climate policy. What tools do you think would be most effective in your community? Why? Be sure to use your knowledge about regulation and market-based climate solutions in supporting your argument.
Vocabulary
- emissions
refers to the amount of greenhouse gases an entity, such as a country or company, produces.
- Clean Air Act
a federal law that regulates airborne emissions from stationary sources (such as factories) and mobile ones (such as cars).
- greenhouse gas
any gas that absorbs heat in the atmosphere and re-emits it back toward Earth, causing a warming effect.
- European Union
a supranational organization composed of twenty-eight European countries, formally established by the 1992 Maastricht Treaty. The EU’s objectives include the economic, political, and security integration of its members, accomplished through such methods as removal of trade barriers; free circulation of EU citizens among certain member countries; and use of a common currency, the euro, by nineteen members.
- biofuel
liquid fuel derived from plants. A prominent example is ethanol, a product of sugarcane or corn.
- cap-and-trade
a policy framework in which a government caps the amount of greenhouse gases that can be emitted in the country or region during a given period. Emissions permits, which allow companies to emit a specific amount of greenhouse gases, are issued or sold to companies, up to the national or regional cap. These permits can be traded among companies—sold by companies that emit less than their targets and bought by those that emit more—creating a financial incentive to lower emissions and providing flexibility for companies that cannot or do not wish to do so.