Oct. 14

All 10 states participating in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative in the Northeast will offer carbon dioxide allowances at RGGI´s second auction scheduled for Dec. 17.

Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont will offer a total of more than 31.5 million allowances for sale with a reserve price of $1.86. RGGI´s first auction on Sept. 25 produced a price of $3.07 per allowance. Each allowance equals one ton.

The 10 RGGI states have urged prospective bidders to apply and qualify for the auction by downloading auction documents from the group´s Web site at www/rggi.org/co2-auctions/information.

The 10 Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states have designed the first market-based, mandatory cap-and-trade program in the United States to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The states have committed to reducing the amount of carbon dioxide that power plants within their borders are allowed to emit. The states have agreed to cap carbon emissions in 2014 and begin reducing the emissions by 2.5 percent each year from 2015 through 2018 for a total of a 10 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.

The auctions now will allow power plants to begin accumulating the credits they will need in the future, and it raises money for the states to spend on promoting energy efficiency, renewable energy technologies, and programs to benefit energy consumers.

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