ETS - Emissions Trading Schemes (EU, NZ, ...) and Forest Carbon Credits

A new report on Thursday said Australia can meet its carbon emissions target by doing nothing more than claiming offsets from re-vegetation of cleared land, regional forest agreements and ending logging of native forests.

Australia has set its target of a 5 percent cut in carbon emissions by 2020, and the study said the federal government has deliberately underestimated these land offsets to justify a weak target in international negotiations.

Clearing a backlog of credits and convincing small countries they can benefit from the UN's carbon offsetting scheme will be amongst the top priority as the Clean Development Mechanism's (CDM) executive board gathers in Bonn, Germany this week to discuss the future of the scheme.

The new year sees emissions trading plans in Japan shelved and under mounting question marks in South Korea as their respective governments face heavy political pressure from industry.

As we stated in a previous post California, the world’s 8th largest economy, has approved an extensive cap-and-trade carbon trading scheme to cut greenhouse gas emissions.