Grow Clean Air

LONDON, May 13 (Reuters Point Carbon) – The United States has proposed launching a global scheme to force all ships to measure and eventually reduce the rate at which they consume energy in a bid to cut emissions of gases blamed for global warming.

LONDON, May 13 (Reuters Point Carbon) – EU carbon permits closed down for the second successive day on Monday as a government sale weighed on prices and optimism about a backloading deal faded.

LONDON, May 13 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Europe’s power companies, warning of a lost decade of low carbon investment, have urged EU lawmakers to set a single mid-term target to cut carbon dioxide emissions and reduce the number of CO2 allowances they hand out each year in the bloc’s carbon market.

LONDON, May 13 (Reuters Point Carbon) - The EU sold 3.462 million spot EU carbon permits on EEX on Monday for 3.23 euros each, according to traders.

BEIJING, May 13 (Reuters Point Carbon) - Tokyo’s emissions market recorded just six trades in the 2012/2013 financial year, according to government data, as a nationwide energy efficiency drive triggered by the Fukushima nuclear meltdown forced many companies to cut energy use and saw the scheme record a surplus of permits.

BEIJING, May 13 (Reuters Point Carbon) – The cost of emitting carbon dioxide in South Korea could reach $150 per tonne by the end of the decade, 15 times more expensive than analysts expect prices in Europe to reach, according to a report published Friday urging the government to rewrite the rules of its future carbon market.

SAO PAULO, May 10 (Reuters Point Carbon) – The Brazilian government opened its upcoming energy auction to electricity from coal-fired plants this week, and drew fire from environmental groups who accused the government of rolling back its highly touted climate policies.

LONDON, May 10 (Reuters Point Carbon) – European carbon permits ended the week down 11 percent on Friday after prices fell on the back of weaker energy markets in thin trade broken by public holidays across Europe, traders said.

LONDON, May 10 (Reuters) – ArcelorMittal, the world’s largest steelmaker, on Friday said it faced weak European demand for its products this year and rising carbon costs at its South African operations from 2015, adding it did not raise any cash from selling spare EU carbon credits in the first quarter.

LONDON, May 10 (Reuters Point Carbon) - Germany sold 4.02 million spot EU carbon permits on EEX on Friday for 3.52 euros each, the exchange said.

BEIJING, May 10 (Reuters Point Carbon) – New Zealand’s government will draft new laws to encourage foresters to help the nation cut emissions of greenhouse gases by planting trees after its refusal to sign up to a second emission cap under the Kyoto Protocol rendered current laws unworkable.

BEIJING, May 10 (Reuters Point Carbon) - Australia will hold two auctions of carbon permits under the nation’s proposed Emissions Trading Scheme by July 1 2014, a full year before the market starts, according to the scheme’s auctioning regulations that became law Friday.

SAN FRANCISCO, May 9 (Reuters Point Carbon) – California carbon allowances (CCAs) for delivery in December 2013 rose 3 cents from their close one week ago to $14.35 a tonne on Thursday as participants took positions ahead of the program’s third allowance auction on May 16.

LONDON, May 9 (Reuters Point Carbon) – European carbon prices, trampled to record lows recently, could face more downside in the next few months if current CO2 permit demand from utilities fades and lawmakers continue to dither over whether to cut supply, analysts said this week.

LONDON, May 9 (Reuters Point Carbon) – EU carbon permits for delivery in December rose 8.9 percent Thursday in thin trade as supply was cut due to a temporary halt in government allowance sales, traders said.

LONDON, May 9 (Reuters Point Carbon) – European lawmakers over the next two months will once again agonise over whether to intervene in Europe’s carbon market to prop up prices, leaving CO2 permits vulnerable to big price shocks that could also hit stocks of some of the EU’s biggest companies.

LONDON, May 9 (Reuters Point Carbon) - Poland’s second largest electricity producer, Tauron Polska Energia generated 3.4 percent more power in the first three months of 2013 than a year ago, data from the company’s interim report showed Thursday.

BEIJING, May 9 (Reuters Point Carbon) - Spot permits in New Zealand’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) barely budged this week, closing Thursday at NZ$2.03, up 3 cents from last week while liquidity fell amid waning interest.

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters Point Carbon) – European carbon dipped for a second day on Wednesday, after Britain pumped fresh supply into the market and speculators continued to take profits following a 30-percent price surge chalked up in the past week, traders said.

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters Point Carbon) – German energy bourse EEX grew its carbon trading revenues by 76 percent in 2012 after it held more government CO2 permit auctions than the previous year, it said Wednesday.

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Italy’s biggest utility Enel produced 12 percent less electricity at its Italian plants in the first quarter, the company said, outpacing a decline in national power demand and likely reducing its demand for emission permits.

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Britain’s Drax Group, operator of one of Europe’s largest coal-fired power plants, stockpiled fewer carbon allowances in the first four months of 2013 than in the same period a year earlier, it said on Wednesday, as the company prepares to burn less CO2-intensive coal and more biomass.

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Three of the world’s biggest cement producers said this week European production of building materials slowed in the first quarter of 2013, a move that will likely see emissions of carbon dioxide fall and surplus of CO2 permits grow across one of the biggest sectors covered by the EU carbon market.

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters Point Carbon) – German energy giant E.ON generated 7.1 percent less power at its EU-based facilities in the first quarter of 2013 compared to last year, due mainly to difficult market conditions, it said in an earnings statement on Wednesday, suggesting the company will require fewer carbon permits this year.

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters Point Carbon) - Britain sold 4.13 million carbon permits at a price of 3.51 euros each on ICE Futures Europe on Wednesday, the exchange said.

SAO PAULO, May 6 (Reuters Point Carbon) – A group of companies involved in public transportation projects for Brazil’s 2014 World Cup bought 200,000 voluntary carbon credits last week to offset their greenhouse gas emissions, marking the first offset deal associated with the major sporting events Brazil will host in the next three years.

SAN FRANCISCO, May 7 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Urban forests across the United States soak up 21 million tons of carbon emissions annually, an amount that will rise as cities expand, the U.S. Forestry Service said in a new report.

LONDON, May 7 (Reuters Point Carbon) – EU carbon gave back some of the market’s recent big gains on Tuesday as hopes dimmed that lawmakers would come to a quick decision over a supply cut plan.

LONDON, May 7 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Electricity generation in Poland dipped 0.5 percent in the first quarter of 2013, extending a 3.8-percent fall last year, preliminary government data showed, suggesting carbon emissions in the EU’s most coal-dependent nation decreased slightly despite rising economic growth.

LONDON, May 7 (Reuters Point Carbon) – Norway, a major buyer of United Nations carbon credits, will this year stop buying offsets generated by wind and hydro projects and will instead target schemes at risk of folding due to low carbon prices, a government official said Tuesday.