Michael J. Walsh is an Executive Vice President of Chicago Climate Exchange, the world's first and North America's only active, voluntary, legally binding integrated trading system to reduce emissions of all six greenhouse gases, with offset projects in North America and worldwide. CCX’s affiliated companies European Climate Exchange and Chicago Climate Futures Exchange host markets for futures products based on European Union carbon dioxide emission allowances and U.S. sulfur dioxide emission allowances. Walsh also serves on the Board of Directors of the Montreal Climate Exchange. In his prior position with Environmental Financial Products (the predecessor company to CCX), Mr. Walsh arranged several international carbon credit transactions and served as liaison and lead writer for a series of five technical papers on international emissions trading prepared for the Government of Canada. As a consultant to the U.S. Agency for International Development, Mr. Walsh provided instructional seminars on emissions trading for industry and government officials from several eastern European countries. He has been a speaker at United Nations climate conferences at Geneva, Kyoto, Buenos Aires, Bonn and The Hague, and has been a keynote speaker at industry conferences and educational workshops around the world, including events in Budapest, Moscow, Rio de Janeiro and Sydney. Mr. Walsh also previously served as a Senior Economist with the Chicago Board of Trade where he directed the Chicago Board of Trade’s efforts to develop exchange-based environmental markets. Walsh designed and managed annual auctions of sulfur dioxide emission allowances conducted as part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency acid rain reduction program. Mr. Walsh has delivered Congressional testimony and provided dozens of presentations to state public utility commissions, national regulatory conferences and industry seminars. As the lead CBOT energy market analyst, he covered electricity market deregulation and evaluated the feasibility of electricity futures contracts. Mr. Walsh also directed, in conjunction with a team of industry and public sector leaders, establishment of the CBOT Recyclable Materials Exchange, an electronic marketplace backed by product standards, grading procedures and dispute resolution services. Walsh represented the CBOT in matters involving several U.S. government agencies including the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Internal Revenue Service and the Environmental Protection Agency. |