Japan seeks carbon credit suppliers to meet targets

Japan is looking for new suppliers of carbon credits as uncertainty over future funding mechanisms for credit suppliers has limited the number of big clean energy projects that sell such credits, a Japanese official said.

Kazuhiko Oe, director of the department for the promotion of carbon trading mechanisms at the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO), said Japan was exploring various schemes to meet its credit needs.

NEDO is in charge of Japan's investments under the Clean Development Mechanism, a scheme that allows rich nation polluters to fund emission cuts in poorer countries and put them toward domestic carbon reduction targets or sell them for a profit.

Speaking at Tokyo symposium on Wednesday, Oe said NEDO should look beyond that mechanism and consider alternatives such as Joint Implementation and Green Investment Scheme programs.

Eastern European countries, which have a surplus of government carbon credits under the Kyoto Protocol to tackle global warming, can sell the credits through those programs.

Oe told Reuters on the sidelines of the symposium that NEDO is looking into bilateral negotiations with Russia, Ukraine, Czech, Hungary and Belarus to look for a large number of credits per contract.

NEDO is set to buy 100 million tons of carbon credits, to be delivered between 2008 and 2012, to help Japan meet its emission targets.

But negotiations over future targets beyond 2012, are dragging on and weighing on climate change projects that supply such credits.

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Source: Reuters