China Plans To Launch SO2 Trading Plan In 2007 - Reuters

[hatrack]

BEIJING - China is planning to launch an emissions trading scheme as early as next year that would require power plants to pay 7 billion yuan a year for the right to emit sulphur dioxide, the South China Morning Post reported.

Under the proposal, part of a drive to cut sulphur dioxide emissions by 10 percent by 2010, power stations would pay 630 yuan a tonne for the quotas, the Hong Kong paper quoted an environmental adviser to the central government as saying.

China is the world's biggest emitter of sulphur dioxide. Coal- and oil-fired power stations were responsible for 11 million of the 25 million tonnes discharged last year, which caused acid rain that affected a third of the country.

Wang Jinnan, vice-president of the Chinese Academy for Environmental Planning, told a seminar in Hong Kong on Wednesday that the proposal was subject to consultation with China's provinces and the power sector, the paper said.

EDIT

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/37916/story.htm

[Deja Q]

1. Pay for the right?

Watch as power companies raise rates on their customers so they can afford to spew it.