LONDON (Reuters) - A United Nations climate panel will ask a sub-panel to investigate further claims that a Kyoto Protocol scheme may be incentivizing participants to emit more greenhouse gases, environmental groups said on Friday.
Several carbon-cutting projects approved under Kyoto's $2.7 billion Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), which helps provide carbon finance to emerging economies, have been accused by green groups of intentionally increasing their emissions in order to destroy them and collect more carbon offsets.
The roughly 20 projects in question, the most lucrative under the scheme, are mainly in China and India. They destroy a potent waste gas called hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) and account for more than half of the 423.5 million offsets issued to the 2,300 projects approved to date.
The CDM's 10-member executive board, meeting in Bonn, Germany this week, will seek further input on the matter from the scheme's methodology panel, the green groups attending the meeting said.
A U.N. spokesman refused to comment as the meeting was still in progress at the time of writing.
The groups, including CDM-Watch and Noe21, have accused HFC project owners, mainly refrigerant gas manufacturers, of "gaming" the system and have called for the UN to suspend the issuance of offsets under the its methodology for HFC projects.
"We welcome the board's decision to officially launch an investigation. However we are concerned that, without a suspension of the methodology, this could be used to delay taking necessary action," said Chaim Nissim of Noe21.
The methodology panel, after considering a submission made by CDM-Watch earlier this year, raised concerns in a report on July 1 but said more investigation was needed.
It said there was a strong incentive to avoid improving the plant's efficiency during any refurbishments because of benefits from the CDM.
The CDM's board will also request that more information is collected from HFC project participants, sources attending the meeting told Reuters.
The board's official meeting report will be published on Friday evening.
