Voluntarily India has reduced 108 million metric tones of CO2 equivalent over a period of one year, earned more than $ 200 Mn through CER

India is richer by $ 200 Mn by way of earning Certified Emission Reductions (CER) under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) over a period of one year.  As many as 342 projects have been approved with host country approval accounting for 10887923.6 CER during the period of July 13, 2010 to July 13, 2011. Calculating average price of 13 euros per CER, India has earned $ 204.5 Mn and reduced 108 million metric tones of CO2 equivalent during this period.
 

Out of 342 approved projects, 249 projects are from energy industries which include both renewable and non-renewable sources.  Energy Demand category accounts for 19 projects while 18 projects have been approved from manufacturing industries. Waste handling and disposal accounts for eight approved projects while metal production and transport sectors account for one and two projects respectively.
 

Certified Emission Reductions (CERs) are a type of emissions unit (or carbon credits) issued by the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) Executive Board for emission reductions achieved by CDM projects and verified by a DOE under the rules of the Kyoto Protocol. CERs can be used by member countries in order to comply with their emission limitation targets or by operators of installations covered by the European Union Emission Trading Scheme (EU ETS) in order to comply with their obligations to surrender EU Allowances, CERs or Emission Reduction Units (ERUs) for the CO2 emissions of their installations. CERs can be held by governmental and private entities on electronic accounts with the UN.
 

Out of 342 projects, private projects are sharing the majority. As many as 330 projects have been approved which are basically private projects totaling to 9670957.6 CER. Nine projects have been approved, proposals for which have been floated by various state or local governments of India while only three central government projects have been registered and approved under the manufacturing industries.

As on date, the National CDM Authority has accorded Host Country Approval to 2004 projects amounting to 654407145.99 CER by 2012. Though India does not have emission reduction target under the Kyoto Protocol, however, approved CDM projects have the potential to reduced 650 million metric tonnes of CO2 equivalent by year 2012.
 

Meanwhile, Analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance shows that June saw the highest ever volume of carbon allowances (EUAs) traded in the European emissions market. Volumes on the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), which accounts for around 91 per cent of the EU emissions market, reached 654Mt CO2e for June and 78Mt on a single day on June 23 of this year. This beats the previous highs of 584Mt in March 2011 and 53Mt on March 16 this year.
 

These high volumes came about as the market reacted to a combination of influences, including concerns about an oversupply of emission allowances, falling oil prices, the European Commission's proposed energy efficiency package and the precarious state of Greece's economy. This caused to the price of the Dec-11 EUA contract to plummet 22 per cent in five days from €15.65/t on June 17 to €12.26/t on June 24.
Overall the second quarter of 2011 saw volumes of carbon emission rights traded throughout the world decline slightly, by three per cent. The value of the market however increased to €26.4bn, up six per cent from the first quarter of 2011. This rise in market value was driven by higher carbon prices in the European Union emission trading system (EU ETS) in April, May and early June compared to the first quarter of 2011.
 

On average, Dec-11 EUA and CER prices increased by eight per cent and seven per cent respectively in the second quarter compared with Q1. The firm prices were driven by Germany's decision to phase out nuclear power and the expectation that European power companies will need to start buying more allowances to compensate for the lack of nuclear power and the removal of free allocations in 2013 when Phase III of the scheme begins.
 

The main cause of the slight decline in traded volumes in Q2 was the dwindling interest in the market for primary Certified Emission Reduction (CER) credits issued under the Clean Development Mechanism of the Kyoto Protocol. With the lack of progress towards a new global climate agreement, transactions of CERs and Assigned Amount Units fell by 5 per cent in Q2 compared with Q1.

Bloomberg New Energy Finance believes that overall the carbon market in 2011 will trade at record levels of around €106bn – an increase of 27 per cent on 2010’s revised figure, driven by a boost in demand for allowances from utilities in the EU ETS.