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Pollution pays off for billionaire

Aug 12th, 2009
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http://www.smh.com.au/environment/global-warming/pollution-pays-off-for-billionaire-20090811-eh0k.html

Marian Wilkinson and Ben Cubby

Michael Kadoorie, left, in Hong Kong. Photo: AFP

A HONG KONG billionaire will receive millions of dollars in compensation under the Rudd Government’s emissions trading scheme – but would get almost twice as much under the Opposition’s plan.

The tycoon and philanthropist, Michael Kadoorie, is the chairman of CLP Holdings, formerly China Light and Power. The company, partly owned by his family, has power stations in Hong Kong, China, India and Thailand but one of its most heavily polluting plants is Yallourn in Victoria.

Under the Government’s scheme, Yallourn would share in $3.9 billion in free permits and assistance allocated to electricity generators to help them when companies and consumers begin to pay for emissions from 2011.

But under the scheme the Opposition Leader, Malcolm Turnbull, is advocating, the amount of compensation for generators such as CLP would more than double.

Mr Turnbull is demanding the Government raise the amount of assistance to between $8 billion and $10 billion.

The author of the Frontier Economics report Mr Turnbull released on Monday, Danny Price, has been one of the NSW Labor Government’s top-paid energy consultants for a decade and helped design the failed plan for privatising the state’s electricity industry.

Last year the federal Climate Change Minister, Penny Wong, promised that electricity generators would get the $3.5 billion assistance spread over five years because it was ”a necessary and important contribution to support essential new investment in the Australian electricity generation sector”.

Apart from Sir Michael’s company, which owns Victoria’s TRUenergy, British power giant International Power will also benefit through its ownership of the Hazelwood and Loy Yang B plants.

The British company owns generators in Indonesia, Britain, Pakistan and Europe and recently sold its Czech power plants for a reported $US1.24 billion ($1.48 billion).

The investment company, Innovest, in a report for the Australian Conservation Foundation, says International Power could receive about $84 million, Sir Michael’s company, CLP Power International, $55 million and Japan’s Tokyo Electric Power $31 million for its partial ownership in the Loy Yang A station.

The companies declined to comment yesterday on the Opposition’s latest commitment but both have been vocal in demanding Senator Wong increase the assistance.

The head of the Energy Supply Association, Brad Page, told the Herald the foreign generators’ claims were not exaggerated.

”There is a genuine, serious issue here”, he said. ”It’s not about who owns these companies and assets. This is about the sovereign risk that is attached to Australia.”

Australian Carbon Trade Scheme

Jul 24th, 2009
by AdminCTA.
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AUSTRALIA, Reuters in Canberra

Australian plans for a sweeping carbon trade scheme opened new divisions within the opposition parties on Friday, boosting hopes Prime Minister Kevin Rudd will win approval for his plan and avoid a possible snap election.

Rudd, who remains well ahead in the polls, could have the option of an early election if laws to set up carbon trading remain stalled in parliament’s upper house Senate, which is poised to reject the plan in a scheduled vote on August 13.

But senior Liberal opposition lawmaker Tony Abbott on Friday called for his conservative party to change policy and pass the carbon trade bills to avoid an early election it could not win.

“As a general rule, oppositions should welcome elections, but this would make it even harder to keep the focus on the Rudd government’s addition to borrowing and spending,” Mr Abbott wrote in the Australian newspaper.

Mr Rudd is due to face the voters in late next year or early 2011, but could call a snap poll early next year if the Senate rejects the carbon trade plan twice. Mr Rudd’s Labor needs seven extra votes to pass laws through the obstructive Senate.

The opposition, which controls the largest Senate voting bloc, is struggling for support in polls and would prefer a late next year election on the issue of government debt and economic management, rather than fight early on climate change.

Based on current opinion polls, Mr Rudd would easily win a second term in office with an increased majority, while the Liberal and National Parties would lose up to 20 seats..

Opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull has raised the possibility of amending and passing the carbon trade laws, although he still wants a final vote postponed until early next year and after December’s global climate change talks in Copenhagen.

The suggestion has angered many of Mr Turnbull’s Liberal colleagues, who want the government plan to be defeated, and the junior opposition National Party, which is implacably opposed to the carbon trade scheme.

Mr Rudd wants the laws passed before the Copenhagen summit, so Australia can go to the global talks with a commitment to cut Greenhouse gas emissions by up to 25 per cent by 2020, based on 2000 levels, if the rest of the world takes similar action.

Gary Cox, vice president of commodities at Newedge Australia, said interest was returning to Australia’s fledgling carbon trading market on raised hopes the parliament would pass the carbon trade legislation.

“We’ve had some Europeans and local people get involved in the CER (Kyoto-backed Certified Emission Reductions) market again for the first time since the scheme was delayed,” said Mr Cox. CERs are traded carbon credits for emission reductions.

The market went dead in May after the government postponed the scheme’s introduction until mid-2011, Mr Cox said, but a fresh trade happened this week when an Australian electricity generator unwound previously purchased December next year CERs.

CERs trade on the European Climate Exchange and imports will be permitted to offset carbon emissions once the Australian scheme is up in running.

Interest was also returning in moribund Australian Emission Units, which are the basic unit of compliance and trade in the planned regime, Mr Cox said. Each unit represents one metric tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent of greenhouse gas emissions.

Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner on Friday talked up the option of an early election on climate change, saying a poll could be inevitable if the Senate was too obstructionist.

“Well if enough things are getting blocked in the Senate that is effectively making it impossible for the Government to get its programme through, or to govern,” Mr Tanner told Australian radio.

The carbon trade scheme will cover 1,000 of Australia’s biggest companies and will put a price on carbon pollution, giving business a financial incentive to curb emissions.

Lamma Island power station cleans up its act to meet pollution-reduction targets

Jul 7th, 2009
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Austin Chiu, SCMP

Hongkong Electric (SEHK: 0006) has installed new equipment at its Lamma Island power station, marking the completion of the first phase of a HK$1 billion project aimed at reducing emissions of gases that contribute to smog and acid rain.
The first phase of the project included the installation of a flue-gas desulfurisation system, which cuts sulfur dioxide emissions, and a burner system designed to produce less nitrogen oxides. The new kit is expected to reduce emissions of sulfur dioxide by 45 per cent and of nitrogen oxides by 23 per cent.

Two more desulfurisation systems and another low-nitrogen-oxides burning system are to be installed by April.

The new desulfurisation equipment, using German technology, can remove 92 per cent of the sulfur dioxide content from coal smoke. The low-nitrogen-oxides burner system, from the US, cuts production of the gases by 60 per cent.

The firm also expects to boost the proportion of its power output produced by burning liquefied natural gas to 30 per cent by January, after the conversion of an oil-fired generating unit. It already has one LNG-powered generator.

Burning LNG does not produce sulfur dioxide or respirable suspended particles, so increasing its use would mean lower emissions, said Tso Che-wah, the company’s general manager for projects.

“With the emission-reduction programme, together with our plan to increase gas-fired generation to around 30 per cent, we are confident of achieving the government’s 2010 emissions targets,” Dr Tso said.

The government has set a target of cutting sulfur dioxide emissions by 45 per cent from 1997 levels. It wants to reduce emissions of nitrogen oxide by 20 per cent and of respirable suspended particles and volatile organic compounds both by 55 per cent.

Dr Tso also said the company was working on the environmental- impact assessment for its proposed wind farm off Lamma Island, which would comprise 35 wind turbines with a generating capacity of 100 megawatts. The proposal would be ready for public consultation by the end of the year, he said.

Meanwhile, the Advisory Council on the Environment yesterday approved CLP Power (SEHK: 0002)’s proposal to build a wind farm off Sai Kung on the condition that it increase fisheries resources, maintain close contact with the fishery industry and strengthen environmental monitoring.

Inventor Aims To Generate His Own Power

Jun 21st, 2009
by AdminCTA.
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Dan Kadison, SCMP – Jun 21, 2009

Lucien Gambarota wants to go off the grid – the electrical grid, that is.
In the next couple of months, the local inventor will use alternative energy technologies to try to generate all of the electricity needed for his new Kowloon headquarters.

“My target is simple. I want to pay zero dollars to CLP, because if I pay zero dollars that means I am carbon free,” Mr Gambarota said.

The 51-year-old made the announcement during the opening of his new Wai Yip Street, Kwun Tong, workshop yesterday. There, in the nearly 8,000 sq ft space, he told dozens of guests that he had already been able to cut his carbon footprint by 88 per cent.

“This place here was using … 250 kilowatt-hours a year per square metre – and there is nothing wrong with that. This is the average in Hong Kong,” said Mr Gambarota, the founder of the MotorWave Group, a renewable energy company.

But he is in an environmentally friendly industry, and he wanted to do better. He and his workers added insulation, switched to compact fluorescent lighting and removed the air conditioning units. They “gutted, cancelled, deleted, changed, modified” everything they could, he said.

Now, “we are down to 40 [kilowatt-hours a year per square metre],” Mr Gambarota said to applause. The space was “releasing something like … 70 tonnes of [carbon dioxide] a year … now we release 8.2 tonnes.”

The difference translates to savings of more than HK$85,000 a year, but Mr Gambarota isn’t content with annual electricity costs of HK$12,000.

He plans to go up to the roof and install solar and wind energy equipment, including his own special brand of wind turbines, to see if he can produce all of his own electricity.
“Can we do it? I’ll tell you in two months. But we’ll be very, very close to that,” he said. “And why is it important? Because, most probably, we’ll be the first factory in the world to have such a low carbon print.”

Guests at Mr Gambarota’s workshop yesterday included Civic Party vice-chairman Albert Lai Kwong-tak; Civic Party legislators Audrey Eu Yuet-mee and Alan Leong Kah-kit; Carbon Care Asia chairman Chong Chan-yau; Alfred Sit Wing-hang, assistant director of the Electrical and Mechanical Services Department; and Danny Ngai Kam-fai, vice-president of the Chinese Manufacturers’ Association and a shareholder in Mr Gambarota’s company.

Mr Leong, whose Civic Party has proposed a “green New Deal” job creation plan, said he supported the inventor’s efforts. “The whole Legislative Council supports redefining our supplies and demands in a new economy,” Mr Leong said. “So I think I’m in the right place today to witness how Hong Kong industrialists, Hong Kong industries, [are] doing something towards that goal.”

Mr Lai also issued a challenge to Mr Gambarota: generate additional electricity and feed it back into the grid. “We will work together,” Mr Lai told the inventor. “We will work on the policy side, and you will work on the technology side to make sure this workshop actually produces energy and not just consumes it.”

Calculating The Real Carbon Footprint Of Vehicles

Jun 6th, 2009
by AdminCTA.
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environmentalresearchweb – Jun 8, 2009

Examining the energy requirements and greenhouse-gas emissions over the entire life cycle of a vehicle, including processes such as manufacture rather than simply operation, reveals that the new combined values increases by 63% for cars and buses, 155% for rail and 31% for air transport. So say researchers at the University of California at Berkeley, US, who believe that their work will be critical in determining the true environmental footprint of all vehicles because until now only tailpipe analyses have been considered.

Mikhail Chester and colleagues calculated the amount of energy required, and the quantity of emissions produced, over the entire lifetimes of automobiles (both buses and cars), trains and aircraft. The analysis included the energy, greenhouse-gas emissions and the production of air pollutants – such as sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide %ndash; associated with vehicle manufacture, the transport infrastructure required, fuel production and the supply chain, as well as actual operation of the vehicle itself.

Consumption
Consumption

“Including life cycle-component inventories results in around a 40% energy and greenhouse-gas increase over direct vehicle operation for autos, while for rail there is about a doubling,” Chester told environmentalresearchweb. For aircraft the increase is around 30%.

Chester says that it is all too common to evaluate transport emissions based simply on the amount of fuel that vehicles consume. Often we see rankings based on these numbers, and global-warming mitigation schemes are subsequently based on such figures. But we need to analyse a vehicle’s life-cycle components to evaluate properly how much energy it consumes and thus the amount of emissions that it produces, he explained.

The researchers say that the amount of occupancy can easily change the relative performance of the transport modes.

The work will be critical for policy and decision makers because the researchers have also analysed which life-cycle components have the most impact on the environment. “While policy has often focused on the vehicle’s tailpipe emissions (for example, in the US Corporate Average Fuel Economy Standards, and removal of lead from petrol), our study shows that you may not want to focus on this component but somewhere else in the mode’s life cycle,” said Chester.

One of the best examples of such a strategic error is that of sulphur emissions, he stressed. Much has been done to remove sulphur from petrol and diesel fuels in recent years but, according to the new study, the bulk of sulphur emissions for transport actually comes from the electricity needed to manufacture a vehicle. This is particularly true for vehicles that are fabricated using electricity that is produced in coal-powered plants.

The team has already applied its inventory to several major metropolitan regions in the US. “We have also gone on to evaluate the life-cycle environmental impacts of the proposed California high-speed rail,” revealed Chester.

The researchers used models that calculate the amount of electricity needed to produce the components of the three modes of transport. From this, they were able to determine the amount of polluting emissions created during different manufacturing processes. They then compared these values with the emissions produced by the same vehicles when they are on the road – the classical tailpipe scenario. The data employed were taken from previous literature, such as government reports, and more detailed modelling software like the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Mobile Software for vehicle-operation emissions and the US Federal Aviation Administration’s Emission Data Modelling Software for aircraft emissions.

The work is published in Environmental Research Letters

Mitsubishi Heavy to Test CO2 Recovery from Coal-fired Flue Gas

May 25th, 2009
by AdminCTA.
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Atsushi Takano, Nikkei Monozukuri, techon.nikkeibp.co.jp – 25 May 2009

Absorbing solution “KS-1.” It is an amine-based material having an absorbing performance higher than that of monoethanolamine (MEA), which has been used thus far. The KS-1 helps reduce the amount of absorbing solution used in the entire plant.

A conceptual image of the demonstration plant with a recovery capacity of 3,000t per day

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd (MHI) and Southern Company, a major US power company, will jointly launch a field test in 2011 to recover high-purity carbon dioxide (CO2) from coal-fired flue gas.

The two companies will set up a CO2 recovery demonstration plant, which is designed to be built at a medium-scale thermal power station in Alabama, the US. Based on the results of this demonstration plant, they will aim to commercialize the recovery plant in the future.

The field test will be subsidized by the US government. The demonstration plant will be constructed in Plant Barry, a coal-fired power station owned by Southern’s subsidiary Alabama Power. Recovered CO2 will be compressed and stored in an aquifer deep underground.

The demonstration plant is composed of various facilities such as those for pre-processing, CO2 absorption/reclamation (absorption and reclamation towers) and CO2 injection. The plant will recover 500t of CO2 per day (equivalent to that produced when 25,000kW electricity is generated). The recovery rate is 90% or higher. The purity of recovered CO2 is expected to be 99.9%.

The recovery process is as follows. Coal-fired flue gas contains not only CO2 but also ‘impurities’ such as SOx, NOx, heavy metals and halogen compounds. These impurities are removed as much as possible in the pre-processing facilities, and the flue gas is cooled to near room temperature.

Flue gas with most impurities removed is taken into the absorption tower. Inside the tower, the gas is brought into contact with an absorbing solution so that only CO2 is absorbed into the solution. The solvent, “KS-1,” is an amine-based material co-developed by MHI and Kansai Electric Power Co Inc.

Next, the solution containing CO2 is sent to the reclamation tower, where CO2 and the solution are separated from each other by heating. Then, CO2 is recovered, and the solution is recycled.

MHI has already commercialized a system to recover CO2 from natural gas-fired flue gas. But, in order to apply this system to coal-fired flue gas, an additional process is required to remove heavy metals and halogen compounds because the impurities contained in natural gas-fired flue gas are only SOx and NOx.

Electric Power Development Co Ltd is also testing a CO2 recovery plant for coal-fired flue gas at its Matsushima Thermal Power Plant. However, the amount of CO2 recovered at the plant is only 10t per day. Therefore, a field test needs to be carried out using a larger scale plant for commercialization.

In addition to the field test announced this time, MHI is planning to construct a demonstration plant with a recovery capacity of 3,000t per day in the UK and intends to start trial operations in 2015.

Tokyo Gas Halves CO2 Emissions in Hydrogen Production

May 16th, 2009
by AdminCTA.
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Chiho Matsuda, Nikkei Monozukuri, techon.nikkeibp.co.jp – Mar 16, 2009

Tokyo Gas Co announced March 12, 2009, that it succeeded in halving CO2 emissions in a verification test of CO2 separation/collection in a hydrogen production process while maintaining its production efficiency.

Tokyo Gas has been developing and verifying hydrogen production equipment intended for fuel cell vehicles at its JHFC Senju Hydrogen Station (in Arakawa Ward, Tokyo). In November 2008, the company attached a CO2 separation/collection device to the equipment and started the test.

  • JHFC Senju Hydrogen Station, where the verification tests were conducted. The reformer testing equipment on the left is 3.6 (W) x 2.6 (D) x 2.3m (H), and the CO2 separation/collection testing equipment is 2.1 (W) x 1.5 (D) x 2.3m (H).The structure of the hydrogen separation type reformer

    • Analysis of the obtained data showed that the energy loss due to CO2 separation/collection was about 3%.

    At the station, hydrogen is produced from city gas by using a hydrogen separation type reformer that produces hydrogen and CO2 by the steam-reforming reaction between city gas (methane) and steam. The generated hydrogen is extracted during the production process by installing a film that transmits only hydrogen in the reformer where the reaction occurs.

    The hydrogen production efficiency is 81.4%, which is “the world’s highest” for a process of producing hydrogen from fossil fuel, according to Tokyo Gas.

    The reformer carries out the reforming reaction and hydrogen separation in one process, contributing to downsizing of equipment. In addition, CO2 concentration in the reforming offgas (the gas left behind after extraction of hydrogen), which is generated during the hydrogen production process, is 70 to 90%; therefore, it is easy to separate and collect CO2.

    The hydrogen separation/collection device compresses the reforming offgas exhausted from the reformer to 7MPa and cools it down to -20°C so as to liquidize CO2 in the reforming offgas for separation and collection. Combined gases containing methane and hydrogen are used as a fuel for heating the reformer.

    Tokyo Gas is planning to form the “Local Hydrogen Network,” which evolves around hydrogen stations equipped with a distributed CCTS (carbon dioxide capture, transportation and storage) function for CO2 separation, transportation and processing.

    With the network, hydrogen will be supplied to fuel cell vehicles, as well as to houses, offices and plants near the station through pipelines. The company intends to further reduce CO2 by using fuel cells with higher efficiency. Also, it plans to utilize the results of the verification tests for creating this network.

    The reformer used for the experiment was developed jointly by Tokyo Gas and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd as part of the “Basic Technology Development Program for Safe Use of Hydrogen,” a program for the period from fiscal 2005 to 2007, implemented by the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO).

    California Approves Emissions Reductions

    Apr 23rd, 2009
    by AdminCTA.
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    KEVIN YAMAMURA, McClatchy Newspapers – Apr. 23, 2009

    California became the first state in the nation Thursday to mandate carbon-based reductions in transportation fuels in an attempt to cut the state’s overall greenhouse gas emissions.

    The California Air Resources Board approved a phased-in reduction starting in 2011, with a goal of shrinking carbon impacts 10 percent by 2020. Fuel producers can comply in different ways, such as providing a cleaner fuel portfolio, blending low-carbon ethanol with gasoline or purchasing credits from other clean-energy producers.

    California’s low-carbon fuel standard could lead to a national measure under President Barack Obama, as well as shape how the transportation sector evolves. But businesses and oil industry critics warned that more research is necessary and that its action would lead to higher costs for consumers in a recessionary economy.

    Board Chairwoman Mary Nichols hailed the low-carbon fuel standard as a major step in moving the nation away from oil dependence and toward alternative fuels that generate lower greenhouse gas emissions.

    “By changing the way we think about fuels and requiring them all to be lower carbon, I think we are now finally creating an opportunity for other types of advanced transportation to compete on a level playing field,” Nichols said.

    California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger asked the air board in 2007 to consider a low-carbon fuel standard as way to meet the state’s overall goal of cutting greenhouse gases 25 percent by 2020, as mandated by a 2006 law.

    The air board looked at the entire carbon “intensity” of fuels, rather than the impact of emissions from use alone. That meant considering the emissions from the start of production to lasting impacts not directly related to fuel supply.

    That led to some controversy over the air board’s regulations dealing with corn-based ethanol producers.

    A staff analysis assigned additional greenhouse-gas consequences to their fuels alone based on the potential impacts that ethanol production has on forests and green space. The theory is that increased ethanol production reduces the existing amount of farmland for food crops, which in turn leads to cultivation of untouched land that previously captured carbon.

    Ethanol advocates challenged the report’s findings, disputing that their corn-based production had a significant impact on greenhouse-gas increases elsewhere. But they also suggested that petroleum and other fuels were not given the same treatment.

    Gen. Wesley Clark, a former Democratic presidential candidate, testified on behalf of Growth Energy, an ethanol advocacy group. He said that greenhouse-gas emissions related to the U.S. military in the Middle East should be considered as part of oil’s calculation.

    “There are indirect effects for many fuels, but the only indirect effects that have been looked at are the indirect effects in land use for biofuels,” Clark said. “So if we’re going to look at indirect effects, and I think we should, you have to take a broader look and roll in more.”

    The air board promised to work with ethanol producers to update formulas related to the indirect effects of fuels as warranted by future research. But it stood by its findings that other fuels did not have significant indirect impacts.

    “The preliminary analysis is there is no other fossil fuel option that has any direct land use effect that comes anywhere near any of the biofuels,” said Daniel Sperling, an air board member and a University of California-Davis transportation studies expert. “We will be looking carefully to make sure that initial assessment is correct. But I do want to make it clear there was no effort just to focus on the biofuels.”

    Environmentalists and health organizations praised the low-carbon fuel standard as a significant step toward shrinking the state’s carbon footprint and providing cleaner air for residents.

    Roland Hwang, transportation program director for the National Resources Defense Council, said the ethanol regulation is appropriate because it will force ethanol producers to seek cleaner and more sustainable forms of fuel production.

    Bonnie Holmes-Gen, senior policy director for the American Lung Association of California, testified that the new fuel standard would help “reverse the legacy of negative air quality, public health and environmental impacts from petroleum fuels.”

    But oil producers said too many uncertainties surrounded the new regulation and could lead to unintended consequences, such as supply problems.

    “We know that when (consumers) want fuel, they want it when they want it and where they want it, and they want it to be affordable,” said Catherine Reheis-Boyd of the Western States Petroleum Association. “And if they don’t have that, they’re usually pretty expressive about how unhappy they may be.”

    Small business groups also testified in opposition Thursday, some noting that California could hurt its businesses by forcing them to pay higher costs to comply.

    “We’re doing this alone, and what concerns us is that we might really put ourselves at a competitive disadvantage,” said Mark Martinez, CEO of the San Joaquin County Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. “So I want to caution you to really evaluate the concerns of the economy and our small businesses.”

    © 2009 Miami Herald Media Company. All Rights Reserved.

    Time To Prepare For Carbon Regulation: Gartner

    Apr 22nd, 2009
    by AdminCTA.
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    Green Channel Staff, Questex Media Group, Inc – Apr 22, 2009

    Large enterprises are unprepared for the inevitable coming wave of carbon regulation, a Gartner survey of businesses worldwide has found.

    Nearly half of those surveyed said their organization’s planning was not influenced by the prospect of carbon pricing or regulation, and another 36% said they were not sure what preparations their company was making.

    Gartner said the businesses were almost certain to be subject to carbon reporting and pricing in the future and now was the time to begin. IT management teams needed time to gather the necessary data to establish carbon tracking and reporting systems.

    A total of 45.7 % of respondents said that carbon pricing was not influencing their organizations planning, while just 18.3% said it was influencing their organization’s planning for the next 24 months.

    The international survey was based on a questionnaire sent to 626 enterprises about their plans for carbon reporting and pricing, and current and future implementation of carbon reporting or management systems.

    “While the number of enterprises using or planning to use carbon tracking systems exceeds those legally required to do so, given the inevitable requirements to support carbon reporting in the future, the percentage of enterprises preparing is low,” said Gartner research vice president Simon Mingay.

    Regardless of current regulations, enterprises should be building carbon information systems because pressure will inevitably “come down the supply chain to be transparent about carbon emissions,” Mingay said.

    When it came to preparedness for the next two years, the UK and France recorded some of the lowest percentages at 7.9% and 10.5% respectively, compared to 21.1% of Chinese and 20% of Indian enterprises.

    However, as a region Western Europe was best prepared – 32% said they had some kind of system in place, twice as many as Asia-Pacific or US businesses.

    A further question about whether organizations would be implementing reporting or management software during the next 18 months showed most were not yet thinking about how carbon pricing or reporting requirements will affect their business.

    “This apparent lack of preparation, and the inevitability that most enterprises will come under increased scrutiny from customers, investors, partners, key stakeholders and, eventually, regulators, should come as a wake-up call to policymakers, boards, senior leadership teams and CIOs,” said Mingay.

    “Despite the lack of specific regulations, midsize and large enterprises in developed economies need to recognize that they will be paying for their emissions at some point — it’s just a matter of when, how much and through what kind of mechanism.

    “Regardless of the recession, enterprises will find themselves under increasing pressure from stakeholders, including investors and customers, to be more transparent about emissions and reduction programs.”

    Airline Emissions

    Apr 19th, 2009
    by AdminCTA.
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    Reuters – April 6, 2009

    Airlines Urge UN to Adopt Global Aviation Carbon Trading Scheme

    jet-airliner

    To avoid having to comply with patchwork regulations from the United States, the European Union and other entities, a group of airlines is proposing a single global carbon emissions cap for the aviation industry.

    The cap, which would be based on the amount of fuel consumed by each carrier, would allow airlines to purchase credits from other entitites. An additional allotment of permits would be auctioned, with the proceeds to go towards the Kyoto Protocol’s adaptation fund for developing nations, development of sustainable aviation biofuels and a U.N.-backed initiative to save forests in developing nations in return for tradeable carbon credits, according to Reuters.

    The proposal comes from the Climate Group, a nongovernmental organization, and Air France/KLM, British Airways, Cathay and Virgin Atlantic. Those airlines recently started a coalition called the Aviation Global Deal Group, with the stated goal of seeing that any global climate treaty include an aviation component.

    The airlines are presenting their proposal to the United Nations April 6, with the hope that nations adopt a global plan by 2013. The European Union has a comprehensive aviation emissions cap set to take effect in 2012.

    The Association of Asia-Pacific Airlines estimates the global aviation industry emits about 650 million tons of CO2 annually.

    Environmental Leader – March 9, 2009

    UK Airlines Fall Under Stricter Emissions Scheme

    boeing2

    The United Kingdom will allow its Environment Agency to fine UK airlines that don’t meet strict emissions standards, according to a news report.

    Recently, the UK had indicated the Environment Agency would supervise a scheme to cap aviation emissions in England and Wales.

    For all of the European Union, starting in 2012, CO2 emissions from aviation will be capped at the average 2004/06 levels. This will be applied to all flights arriving and departing EU airports.

    In other aviation emissions news, Boeing has devised a landing program that cuts fuel use and emissions by giving aircraft tailor-made arrival paths, according to a Reuters story.

    Boeing carried out tests of about 1,000 flights into San Francisco International Airport. Using Boeing 777 and 747 aircraft, the Tailored Arrivals system helped airlines cut fuel consumption by 1.1 million pounds and carbon dioxide emissions by 3.6 million pounds over one year, Reuters reported.

    Environmental Leader – February 12, 2009

    EU Reveals Details Of Airline Carbon Credit Scheme

    plane

    Because of increased costs for air carriers, business travelers to Europe likely would pay higher airline fares after implementation of a European Union requirement for airlines to buy carbon credits to offset their emissions. Because of increased costs for air carriers, business travelers to Europe likely would pay higher airline fares after implementation of a European Union requirement for airlines to buy carbon credits to offset their emissions.

    Last year, the EU proclaimed that most flights touching down in Europe would be covered by a trading system for emissions of greenhouse gases.

    With the EU pairing each airline serving Europe to a single nation that would collect payments, it appears Britain would gain the most, based on the number of daily international flights there. France and Germany would benefit to a lesser degree, according to the International Herald Tribune.

    The International Air Transport Association, an aviation lobby group, claims the system will cost nearly $5 billion each year to comply, according to the article. The United States reportedly is withholding comment on this issue as the Obama administration reviews climate change policies.

    Critics claim the EU carbon trading system is not reducing carbon emissions. Germany’s Green Party, for instance, insists that despite the many benefits of carbon trading, investing in renewable energy is the most cost-efficient way to cut carbon.

    Last June, Air France-KLM derided the EU carbon trading scheme as unfair

    Environmental Leader – March 17, 2008

    EU To U.S. Airlines: Buy Carbon Credits Or Face Fewer Flights

    airplane3-17-08

    airplane3-17-08.jpgU.S. airlines must join the EU emissions trading scheme or an equivalent system in the U.S. or they could face fewer flights to the European Union, Jacques Barrot the EU transport commissioner, has warned, according to the Guardian.

    EU airlines must join the emissions trading scheme in 2012, which could add up to £13 to the price of a return flight as carriers buy “carbon credits.”

    All airlines flying in and out of the EU must join the scheme but the International Air Transport Association has warned that 170 countries oppose the move.

    European carriers want foreign rivals coopted on to the scheme because airlines who refuse to buy carbon credits will offer lower fares.

    In June, a group of six associations representing European airlines published a study that found airlines would have to spend over $60 billion between 2011 and 2022 buying up credits from more fuel-efficient industries to meet their quotas.

    Airline emissions were not part of the Kyoto Protocol’s targets for reducing greenhouse gases. Limits on airlines were left to the International Civil Aviation Organization, a United Nations agency. In September, the IACO passed a resolution opposing plans to include foreign airlines in the scheme.

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