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EKO-ECO is an open discussion on environmental markets (markets for carbon, water, biodiversity, etc.) and how to better incorporate environmental issues and the health of ecosystems into our economic system. Brought to you by The Ecosystem Marketplace and EKO Asset Management Partners.

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Ecosystem Marketplace Surveys the Forest Carbon Frontier

The crowd was standing-room-only in a conference room overlooking the White House and Washington Monument as a panel of speakers presented the findings of Ecosystem Marketplace's new State of the Forest Carbon Markets 2009: Taking Root & Branching Out. Included in the panel were representatives from organizations at the frontier of forest carbon development.

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REDD Negotiators Inch Towards Inking Market-Based Mechanism

It's past midnight here in the Bella Center, and the last time we checked the group drafting the REDD text was still sequestered after being called in more than six hours ago. From the bits and pieces we've managed to hear, however, it looks like they are close to embedding institutional arrangements for direct funding of REDD projects in the document that will be handed up to ministers on Friday, as well as a provision for incorporating the value of ecosystem services into environmental safeguards on REDD projects.

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U.S. Offers $1 Billion for REDD

This afternoon, cloistered several metro stops away from the chaotic Bella Center, the non-profit Avoided Deforestation Partners hosted a line up panels bursting with big names in the forestry and climate world. Presenters including Thomas Friedman moderating an unexpected mix...

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The Copenhagen Prediction Market

Got predictions on the outcome of COP15? Ready to put your (experimental) money where your mouth is? If yes, drop your thoughts in The Copenhagen Prediction Market.During the COP15 conference, the Centre for Energy and Environmental Markets (CEEM) with sponsorship...

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Mapping REDD Risks and Rewards: the Forest Carbon Index

A picture is worth a thousand words, and Resources for the Future's (RFF) new Forest Carbon Index (FCI) uses interactive maps to tell a visual story of forest carbon's global investment potential. Pretty useful stuff, considering that forest carbon's profit potential, stocks and policy hurdles are - like forest resources themselves - entirely place-based.

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In Defense of Offsets

"Paying more for flights eases guilt, not emissions." This catchy title of a recent New York Times article reflects the stance of many organizations that recently decided to scrap programs offering carbon offsets for travel-related emissions. Responsible Travel, Yahoo, and the US House of Representatives are just a few groups that have terminated offset-purchase programs this year, determining that their money was better spent on in-house reduction efforts.

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New Global Water Disclosure Project: A Call to Action to the Corporate Sector

Earlier today the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) announced the latest of their "disclosure" projects -- the Water Disclosure Project (WDP). The CDP, founded in 2000, is an independent, non-profit organization with a mission to collect and distribute high quality information that motivates investors, corporations and governments to take action to prevent climate change. They have created the world's largest database of corporate climate change information. Now they aim to do the same for corporate water information banking on the success of the CDP that "disclosure" can play a key role in accelerating action.

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When is Multi-Credit Banking a Double Dip???

Businessmen seek to maximize their earnings, often by harvesting several income streams from one asset - a strategy that only works if end-users see value in the multitude of products coming at them from one source. Some US states say restored wetlands generate extra value if they also reduce runoff into local waterways, and should earn credits for that. Environmentalists, however, say that's double-dipping at the cost of the environment. The two sides are colliding this week in North Carolina.

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Dialogue on Forests: Talking the Talk

By: Kelly Moore Brands, Biodiversity Research Assistant for Ecosystem Marketplace A few weeks ago, the second Dialogue on Forests, Governance & Climate Change hosted by Chatham House, the Rights and Resources Initiative and World Resources Institute was held in Washington, D.C. The conference focused on policies for improving forest governance, including lessons learned from the UNFCCC negotiations, and particularly on REDD initiatives and how they might be affected by US climate policy.

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Can peat turn REDD in Copenhagen?

Destruction of peatland accounts for up to 50% of Indonesia's greenhouse gas emissions, and was a central theme at a recent conference sponsored by Germany's Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (Society for Technical Cooperation, GTZ). EM's Unna Chokkalingam attended the event, and filed this report.

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