Carbon trading scams raise the temperature

CARBON trading is questionable, not merely on ethical grounds, but on economic and ecological grounds as well. Keith Bradsher highlighted a number of scams in an article in the New York Times on December 21.

He gave the example of an old, inefficient chemical factory in Quzhou in south-east China which emits as much greenhouse gases each year as a million cars in the US or Europe, each of which had clocked up 12,000 miles.

It is estimated the cost of an incinerator to clean up the mess at the factory is in the region of $5m. Yet the foreign companies involved in the deal will pay $500m for the incinerator.