Japan will launch an experimental carbon trading scheme for industry this autumn, Yasuo Fukuda, prime minister, said yesterday as he announced a pledge to cut Japanese greenhouse gas emissions by 60-80 per cent by 2050. In a speech laying out Japan's position on climate change ahead of a summit of the Group of Eight leading economies next month, Mr Fukuda, the meeting's host, said the world needed to "sever its reliance on fossil fuels" and "make a decisive turn toward a low-carbon society".

Hong Kong companies that reduce their carbon dioxide emissions in the city can now sell those cutbacks in a $12.9bn global carbon credit market created under the Kyoto protocol. The new arrangements, announced by the Hong Kong government yesterday, are a step towards rectifying an anomaly created by China's "one country, two systems" rule over its special administrative region. Under this rule, Hong Kong companies are treated no differently from foreign companies when doing business in China.

The good news in the International Energy Agency's report on the future of energy technologies is that there is enough oil left on the planet to allow a huge increase in consumption over the next few decades. The bad news is that the consequences for the climate of burning that much oil would be alarming. The IEA, the rich countries' energy watchdog, is urging the world to start weaning itself off oil, not because supplies are running out but to avoid "significant change in all aspects of life and irreversible change in the natural environment" as a result of global warming.

The cost of carbon dioxide emissions would need to be at least $200 per tonne - many times today's levels - to deliver the cuts scientists propose will be needed to avert the threat of global warming, the International Energy Agency said yesterday. The rich countries' energy watchdog warned that the cost of emissions, set by trading schemes or carbon taxes, would need to be that high to make investment in technologies such as hydrogen-fuelled vehicles commercially viable.

This is last of a three-part series on carbon and climate change to show how global adversity can be changed into an opportunity Priyadarshi Shukla Ahmedabad: There is an evolving carbon market where carbon offsets are traded. The largest is the European Union's Emissions Trading Scheme (EUETS) established for offsetting emissions limitation committed under the Kyoto Protocol.

The Cane and Bamboo Technology Centre (CBTC) has urged the policy makers and development activists in Northeastern states to use bamboo for low carbon economy which would help contain the global warming. A CBTC release issued here today on the occasion of the World Environment Day said as part of the celebrations, about 60 field functionaries from the NE states would be imparted training on bamboo nursery and plantation under the National Bamboo Mission Scheme.

India has established herself as the most encouraging host party in the carbon market, with the largest global share in registered CDM projects at UNFCCC Amrita Ganguly Ajeya Bandyopadhyay & Subrata Ray

World Environment Day is celebrated each year on 5th June, & this commemoration acts as a principal vehicle through which' 1 the environmental ^protection agencies create awareness about environment and enhances public attention and action.

To Use Technological Expertise Of India London: British Telecom (BT), the company that advertises itself with the snappy tagline "It's good to talk', has put its money and mindspace where its mouth is with a bold new pledge to cut its carbon emissions by 80% around the world by 2020.