Are we really surprised?
As we previously discussed, the Kyoto treaty seeks to reduce carbon emissions through a system of carbon credits.
Quite simply, carbon credits is a concept whereby someone (or a company) is allowed to continue their lifestyle unaltered by purchasing someone else’s unused emissions. By this system, you are essentially forcing poor countries and people into a continued cycle of destitude because their ability to improve their lifestyle is hampered because a poor financial decision.
For instance, Canada wants to lower its carbon footprint, so it “buys” 10 million tons of carbon credits from Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe (by signing the Kyoto treaty) is allowed to produce 50 million tons of carbon per year, but currently only produces 40 tons of carbon. It is allowed more carbon than it produces; so it sells its 10 million tons to Canada. Now, Canada has “reduced” its carbon footprint (yay!) and Zimbabwe gets money. It’s the perfect redistribution of wealth system. But, now if Zimbabwe wants to make a power plant to power homes, businesses and improve its economy, it cannot. It is already using all of its carbon credits. To surpass that, would result in hefty fines from the UN under the Kyoto protocol. Zimbabwe is forced into a continual system of destitute because of this. And Canadians feel better about themselves. Isn’t it wonderful?
There have already been many stories about the Carbon credit industry and how its wrought with fraud. Now, we come to know that it’s far worse than expected:
The CDM is one of two global markets which have been set up in the wake of the Kyoto climate summit in 1997. Both finally started work in January 2005. Although both were launched with the claim that they would reduce greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, evidence collected by the Guardian suggests that thus far, both markets have earned fortunes for speculators and for some of the companies which produce most greenhouse gases and yet, through a combination of teething troubles and multiple forms of malpractice and possibly fraud, they have delivered little or no benefit for the environment.
While the CDM is run under the umbrella of the UN, the second market is overseen by the European commission. Before launching, it churned through a mass of figures and produced a maximum number of tonnes of carbon dioxide which could be produced by each nation in the scheme; each nation then handed its big corporations and organisations a set number of permits - EU allocations - defining the number of tonnes of carbon dioxide they could produce between January 2005 and December 2007. But they got their sums wrong.
The carbon market’s leading analysts, Point Carbon, recently calculated that this scheme handed out 170m too many EUAs. In the early days, nobody realised quite how badly the commission had miscalculated, and so the price of the EUAs was quite high, at up to €30 a tonne. But individual companies, particularly energy companies, rapidly saw they had millions of tonnes of EUAs that they didn’t need, and so they sold their surplus, making huge profits. A 2005 report by IPA Energy Consulting found that the six UK electricity generators stood to earn some £800m in each of the three years of the scheme.
A separate report by Open Europe, in July 2006, found that UK oil companies were also poised to make a lot of free money: £10.2m for Esso; £17.9m for BP; and £20.7m for Shell. And behind this profiteering, the environmental reality was that these major producers of carbon emissions were under no pressure from the scheme to cut emissions.
So, in the end Kyoto has become the newest oil for food scandal. A few people making a ton of money, while millions of people suffer (specifically in 3rd world countries) and nothing is gained. Isn’t that typical UN behavior, though? This whole article is worth reading actually, and highlights that the people who are “most concerned” about the environment are really just concerned about making money without actually doing anything to earn it.
But it makes no difference, does it? The carbon credit industry is beset with incompetence and fraud.
One senior figure suggested there may be faults with up to 20% of the carbon credits - known as certified emissions reductions - already sold. Since these are used by European governments and corporations to justify increases in emissions, the effect is that in some cases malpractice at the CDM has added to the net amount of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere.
The problems focus on the specialist companies that validate and verify the projects in the developing world which produce the certified emission reductions. Three of those companies have failed spot checks, which revealed a catalogue of weakness.
Separately, one of the CDM’s experts calculates that as many as one third of the projects registered in India are commercial ventures which do not produce any additional cut in greenhouse gases and were wrongly approved.
Hey. But as long as we are helping the environment, its okay if someone makes a few bucks greasing the wheels right?
And, now the Europeans are in a huff because Bush doesn’t want another Kyoto boondoggle for the G8:
But the US president’s apparent about-turn on global warming last week does not fit the bill for the Germans or the EU. Merkel welcomed Bush’s belated acceptance that global warming was essentially caused by humans, but added: ‘‘As far as the concrete issues are concerned, we still have some work ahead of us.”
Above all, she made clear she would not countenance the US hijacking negotiations, insisting they must remain with the UN. That means some kind of agreement must be reached now to kick off the post-Kyoto talks due to begin in Bali in December.
Of course they want the UN involved. The UN gets a lot of money from Kyoto; and the European Commission gets a little piece on the side for its market as well. Guess we know what the real priorities are, don’t we?
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