Berkeley

New Paper: State’s Cap-and-Trade Program is Falling Short of Goals

Published

7 years ago

May 10, 2019

California regulators are overestimating the impact the state’s cap-and-trade system is having on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new policy brief from a researcher at UC Berkeley’s Center for Environmental Public Policy, part of the Goldman School of Public Policy.

In the paper, published Tuesday, research fellow Barbara Haya argues that the California Air Resources Board has made rosy assumptions about a program protecting forests that may only have accomplished 18% of the emission reductions it claims have been made.

The discrepancy could be as much as 80 million tons of carbon dioxide since 2013, which is equivalent to more than the total annual emissions from California’s entire electricity sector.

The issue is significant because California is designing its cap-and-trade and carbon offset programs to be a model for other jurisdictions, said Haya, who has spent the last eight years analyzing California’s program.

“But this program does much less than we say it does,” Haya says. “The worry is that we’re exporting policy that doesn’t do what we think it is doing.”

“We have to do this right if we want to hit our target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions 40% below 1990 levels by 2030,” Haya added, pointing to a state goal passed by the state Legislature in 2016. “We are setting a standard that a lot of people are looking at.”

At issue is California’s U.S. Forest Projects offset protocol, an incentive program designed by the state to encourage forestland owners across the country to manage forests in ways that increase the amount of carbon stored in them.

These arboreal stores of carbon create credits that California’s industrial polluters, like power plants, can then buy to offset their own emissions.

‘We don’t stop building homes’

But the economy still requires lumber for housing or furniture and wood pulp for paper. And that’s where California’s system runs into trouble, Haya said.

Even when forestland owners change their logging practices, the demand for lumber or paper doesn’t decrease, it shifts to other forests.

“We don’t stop building homes or making wood furniture,” she said. “Those trees have to be cut down somewhere.”

California assumes that 20% of timber harvesting reduced by California’s forest offset protocol is done in forests that are not part of the cap-and-trade system to meet timber demand, and the state accounts for that when it issues carbon credits.

But that 20% figure, called a leakage rate, is not supported by academic literature, Haya found. It’s more accurate to say that, in California’s program, 80% of the reduction is shifted to other forests.

In other words, Haya said, California regulators are underestimating how many carbon-storing trees are actually being protected by the cap-and-trade program. As a result, greenhouse gas emissions are not falling as quickly as they should.

A question of timing

Another problem Haya’s analysis found was a question of when the effects of this leakage rate, whether it is 20% as the state claims or 80% as Haya argues, are accounted for.

Under the current policy, timber companies and other landowners get immediate credit in the cap-and-trade market for deciding to preserve their forests. But the deduction for all the trees still cut down because of demand for wood products — leakage — is applied over the next 100 years.

This system of early reward, Haya said, creates a cap-and-trade market flush with carbon credits that polluters can buy to avoid reducing their own emissions in the short term.

“It’s like getting a 100-year loan for emissions,” Haya said, drawing an analogy. “You get all the credits now but some portion of those credits are for deductions that need to be made over 100 years. We don’t have 100 years.”

The system should instead focus on the net reduction in emissions that is actually created each year, she said.

“We’re starting at deficit where we’re giving a lot of credits to the landowners,” Haya said. “The way the protocol should work is that, in the same year that landowners are being credited for not harvesting, they should be credited for their net effect on emissions.”

Still many positives

While the cap-and-trade program must be fixed, Haya said California emissions regulators are still doing an excellent job reducing the overall amount of greenhouse gas emissions being released in the state.

“We’re doing a lot of really good things to reduce our emissions, including our renewables portfolio standard, our efficiency standards and our support for electric vehicles,” Haya said. “We are a leader in climate change policy in the U.S. and the world, and we’re doing an incredible amount of really good work.”

That’s why structuring the state’s cap-and-trade program to actually reduce emissions is so important, she said.

“We are creating the cap-and-trade program as a model for the world,” she Haya said. “It’s really important that we get this right.”

Will Kane, UC Berkeley News

Posts by Will Kane, UC Berkeley News

Bay Area

UC Berkeley Named Top Public University in the U.S. and No. 7 in the World by ‘U.S. News’

Berkeley has been consistently awarded the distinction of the U.S.’s top public university since the Best Global Universities list was first published in 2014. “A strong position in the Best Global Universities rankings recognizes a school’s profound commitment to world-class research and cross-border academic excellence,” said LaMont Jones, managing editor for education at U.S. News.

Published

4 days ago

June 24, 2026

Oakland Post

Photo by Keegan Houser/UC Berkeley.

The 2026 Best Global Universities rankings evaluated 2,250 research institutions from more than 100 countries

By Lila Thulin

U.S. News & World Report has ranked UC Berkeley No. 7 in its 2026 list of the best global universities, which assesses more than 2,250 research institutions worldwide.

Berkeley also claimed the honor of top public university in the U.S.

Released on Monday, the list evaluates universities from more than 100 countries on 13 metrics such as global and research reputation (as reported by academics and peers) and number of highly cited scholarly papers.

Berkeley has been consistently awarded the distinction of the U.S.’s top public university since the Best Global Universities list was first published in 2014.

“A strong position in the Best Global Universities rankings recognizes a school’s profound commitment to world-class research and cross-border academic excellence,” said LaMont Jones, managing editor for education at U.S. News.

The rankings also assess a university’s strength in various subject areas; these assessments are separate from U.S. News’ 2026 Best Graduate Programs rankings released in April.

This year, Berkeley was named in the top three nationally in seven subject areas – environment/ecology, ecology, water resources, physics, computer science, chemistry, and engineering – and in the top five for a total of 17 subjects. Subject rankings are based heavily on scholarly publications and citations as well as reputation.

In September, U.S. News also released its 2026 Best Colleges list, in which Berkeley was also named the No. 1 public institution among American universities.

That honor joins other accolades judging campus to be the best public university in the country, such as those from Forbes, The Wall Street Journal and Times Higher Education.

Oakland Post

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Arts and Culture

Farwest Region Deltas Celebrate Centennial With “September Breakfast” Honoring Vivian Osborne Marsh

The region was established in 1925 under the leadership of Vivian Osborne Marsh, who became its first Regional Director. Marsh was a pioneering scholar and civic leader, earning recognition as the first Black woman to receive both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in anthropology from UC Berkeley.

Published

10 months ago

September 14, 2025

Oakland Post

Farwest Regional Director, Kimberly Usher, Mayor Barbara Lee, US Representative Lateefah Simon, and Farwest Regional Representative, Radiya Ajibade. Photo courtesy of Farwest Regional Photographer Vicki P. Love.

By Antoinette Porter

Hundreds of members of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., and their guests gathered at the Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union at the University of California, Berkeley, to mark the 100th anniversary of the sorority’s Farwest Region.

Marsh went on to serve as Delta Sigma Theta’s 7th National President, where she launched the sorority’s National Library Project to expand access to books in underserved Black communities in the South. During her presidency, the organization also became a prominent voice in the civil rights movement, lobbying Congress to pass anti-lynching legislation.

Bak in the Bay Area, Marsh devoted her career to advancing educational opportunities, mentoring young people, and strengthening community life. That commitment continues to shape the region, which supports initiatives in education, social justice, and economic development. Current projects include raising scholarship funds for students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, voter education campaigns, and health and wellness programs.

A century after its founding, the Farwest Region of Delta Sigma Theta remains active across California and other western states, carrying forward Marsh’s vision of service and advocacy.

Oakland Post

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Arts and Culture

Cal Performances Presents Angélique Kidjo & Yo-Yo Ma in Sarabande Africaine at UC Berkeley Greek Theatre on Aug. 30

On Saturday, Aug. 30, the pair will debut the Bay Area premiere of Sarabande Africaine, joined by pianist Thierry Vaton, percussionist David Donatien, and special guest Sinkane. The program illuminates centuries of musical interplay between African traditions and Western classical forms, using the Baroque sarabande dance, and its African ancestor, the Congolese spirit dance Zarabanda, as a gateway to exploring the deep, interconnected roots of global music.

Published

10 months ago

August 25, 2025

Oakland Post

Angelique Kidjo and Yo-Yo Ma. Wikimedia photos.

By Carla Thomas

On Labor Day weekend two of the world’s most celebrated musicians and cultural ambassadors, Grammy Award–winning vocalist Angélique Kidjo and legendary cellist Yo-Yo Ma join forces for an evening of music, history, and cultural dialogue at UC Berkeley’s historic Hearst Greek Theatre.

Both Kidjo and Ma have built careers not only as great performers but as passionate advocates for cultural understanding. Sarabande Africaine is as much a conversation about shared heritage as it is a musical performance, blending genres, geographies, and histories.

“Every day there are moments when all of us can feel we are on the inside of something and also when we feel we are on the outside of something,” said Yo-Yo Ma. “To be able to understand both at the same time and oscillate between the two gives us a larger perspective on the world.”

“If your mind is open, and there is no fear, it’s easier to listen, and to question yourself,” said Kidjo.

The upcoming performance is presented within Cal Performances’ Illuminations: “Exile & Sanctuary” series for the 2025–26 season. The production explores exile as more than just physical displacement, but a disruption in identity and belonging, while sanctuary represents both refuge and the creative space where new connections and communities can take shape.

Cal Performances’ Illuminations bridges performances with UC Berkeley’s academic research, pairing the arts with conversations about urgent global issues.

Kidjo’s continued partnership with Cal Performances includes her 2021–22 artist-in-residence, premiering her music-theater work Yemandja, set in 19th-century West Africa during the transatlantic slave trade.

She also participated in the Bias in Our Algorithms and Society panel alongside campus leaders like Jennifer Chayes, and joined the Black Studies Collaboratory for a dialogue on music, diaspora, and the world.

She has since returned to Berkeley for multiple performances, most recently in 2024 at Zellerbach Hall.

Yo-Yo Ma’s history with Cal Performances spans decades, beginning in 1997. One notable project includes the 2018 performance of Bach’s complete cello suites at the Greek Theatre, a testament to his devotion to creating “transformative concert experiences in iconic spaces.”

For tickets and more information, visit calperformances.org.