Today President Obama in his UN speech said something that should strike anyone who ever took an economics course and possessed the capacity for critical thought:

Most importantly, the House of Representatives passed an energy and climate bill in June that would finally make clean energy the profitable kind of energy for American businesses and dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

Ah. Hey, wave that magic wand over this way, too, so that sitting on my couch watching football will be profitable, too.

Of course, to the extent that the above were true it would simply prove far too much. By chance, today the European press (European Voice, EurActiv) reports the Eurocrats have formally recognized the industries that have been smacked by their climate legislation (hint: it reads a lot like those Obama Treasury memos).

From Open Europe’s Daily Roundup, here’s where cap-and-trade hurts:

77% of manufacturing emitters will be exempt from buying EU carbon permits
Euractiv reports that the EU has agreed on a list of industries, ranging from plastics manufacturing to iron and food processing, which will be largely exempted from the rules governing the next phase of the EU’s carbon emissions trading scheme (ETS) after 2013 for fears that their inclusion would move production abroad. These industries will continue to get a higher share of their emission allowances, or permits to pollute, for free after 2013, while the power sector will be obliged to pay for all its permits.
The article notes that the list of exempted industries, covering the most carbon-intensive industries such as steel, cement and chemicals, represents 77 percent of the total manufacturing emissions under the ETS. National experts agreed on a list of 164 sectors deemed to be at risk of relocating their activities to foreign countries that have not adopted greenhouse gas emission restrictions similar to the EU’s.