Harnessing Self-Interest to Realize a Double-Dividend? Achieving Other Environmental Benefits through Carbon Credits

While Canada's domestic action plan to combat climate change is still evolving, it is clear that activities designed to expand carbon sink capacity will be assigned a role in meeting emission reduction commitments. It is also clear that the Government of Canada intends to replicate the approach embraced in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol and will encourage Canadians to undertake activities which expand carbon sink capacity by relying on market forces. To facilitate this, the Plan endorses the domestic recognition of a private properly right, in the form of a carbon credit, as the principal vehicle for expanding national carbon sink capacity. However, the Government of Canada has also emphasized that managing forests and agricultural soils to increase carbon stores will deliver "other significant environmental benefits." This article asks whether the self-interest associated with generating carbon credits will necessarily realize these other potential environmental benefits. Will Canadians enjoy the "double dividend" they have been promised?