State considers cap, trade plan solution to CO2 (Maine)

http://www.bangordailynews.com/news/t/news.aspx?articleid=143689&zoneid=500

BANGOR - Maine officials are debating whether to follow the lead of other Northeastern states hoping to generate a financial windfall from a regional pact to curb greenhouse gas emissions from power plants.

Eight states including Maine have signed onto a first-in-the-nation agreement that aims to cap and then reduce by 10 percent carbon dioxide emissions from power plants by 2019.

Participating states are allowed to tailor some aspects of the plan to their needs. One of the biggest policy issues left to the states’ discretion is whether to sell off CO2 emissions "allowances" to power plants or to offer most of them to the producers at no cost.

Selling these allowances would generate millions of dollars — an estimated $12 million to $30 million in Maine’s case — for states’ energy-conservation programs. But critics of the plan contend the costs will ultimately come out of electric ratepayers’ pockets and could put some of Maine’s larger paper mills at a competitive disadvantage.

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