The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative--the first coalition of states to pull together to cap greenhouse gas emissions, composed of New York, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticutt, Delaware, New Jersey, and Maryland--seems have to put its program into place, according to the New York Times. From what I can tell, it appears to be a fairly conservative cap-and-trade program. First, thankfully, it learns from the European experience, and it looks like most carbon credits will be auctioned, rather than given away. Second, however, it looks like it only applies to power plants. Third, they've strictly limited what other sources of carbon can be used for emissions credits. (And, though, it's never straightforwardly said, I assume that actually using renewable energy is okay, too. Presumably, that's considered a within-firm thing that directly lowers their carbon emissions, rather than something that has to be traded using the carbon credit.)
Anyway, it's interesting from a climate geek perspective, but the really nifty thing is the Times' interactive infograph, which has a map of power plant emissions in the region, a graphic to show how much carbon the plan cuts, and cute diagrams of the permitted activities for generating credits.