Carbon credit market up 41% in 6 months to euro 15bn

Global greenhouse gas emission trade in the first six months of 2007 totalled euro15.8 billion (Rs 90,700 crore), up 41 per cent from the year-ago period, Point Carbon, a leading carbon market information provider said today.

In terms of volume, a total 1.2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents were traded during the period, up 45 per cent from a year ago.

UN's clean development mechanism scheme, which generates carbon credits, witnessed a trade volume of 372 million tonnes in carbon dioxide equivalent gases valued at euro4.1 billion (Rs 23,500 crore).

Developed countries are bound by the Kyoto Protocol to cut greenhouse gas emission during the period 2008-12 by at least 5 per cent of the level in 1990.

One way to cut emission is by buying certified emission reductions, or carbon credits, which are generated by clean development mechanism projects that reduce greenhouse gas emission.

A project becomes eligible to sell one credit if it reduces 1 tonne greenhouse gas emission.

In the secondary market, in which buyers purchase credits from parties other than the issuer, volume doubled to 80 million tonnes from 40 million tonnes in January-July and was valued at euro1.3 billion (Rs 7,500 crore), compared with euro571 million (Rs 3,300 crore) during the year ago-period, the report from Point Carbon said.

The European Union's emissions trading scheme accounted for two-thirds of the traded volume in the first-half of 2007, with 775 million tonne carbon dioxide equivalents changing hands worth euro11.5 billion (Rs 66,000 crore).

The EU's scheme covers over 10,000 power stations and other stationary sources of greenhouse gas emission in 27 member countries. European Union's ETS, the world's first emissions trading scheme, works on a cap-and-trade basis, forcing companies to emit less carbon dioxide than their Kyoto Protocol target allows, or buy carbon credits from elsewhere.