Sometimes it is sad and infuriating to be right about something

A carbon trader, who perhaps understandably wishes to remain anonymous, has confirmed that, as outlined with circumstantial evidence in my previous post, New Zealand is awash with hot air ERU carbon credits from the Ukraine, using a mechanism to monetise AAUs grandfathered to the Ukraine (in the Kyoto scheme) for doing nothing at all. These credits currently sell for about 25 cents in our scheme.

Not only that, he corroborated rumours that some forest owners are recycling ERUs and NZUs to make money. NZUs are currently worth around $3.40 in our scheme, and may increase in value once the supply of ERUs is shut off. An owner can get NZUs from C sequestration, then repay them with cheap ERUs, then get NZUs from the same forest, then repay them with ERUs, and so on and so on. These NZUs are mostly being hoarded in anticipation of a big payoff if prices rise. Shameful.

Also, reputedly some companies that have been "grandfathered" NZUs have surrendered ERUs to meet their commitments, and kept the free NZUs that you and I granted them to "soften" the blow of the NZ Emissions Trading Scheme, again in anticipation of a price rise.

These actions are the ultimate "Money for nothing" and are morally repugnant.

Hon Tim Groser, the Minister for Climate Change Issues, and ACT MP John Banks are the architects of this mess, probably through ignorance, although we tried to warn them not to allow unrestricted imports of credits into NZ.

Meanwhile New Zealand's emissions trading scheme remains an utter failure and our greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise. The scheme could be fixed, though - see my previous post.