February 26, 2008 (Bloomberg) – Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., the fourth-largest U.S. securities firm, said it would trade United Nation emission credits in Japan, the first non-Japanese bank to win permission to buy and sell the environmental products there. Lehman has opened an account in Japan’s emissions registry, an ownership tracking system, the bank said in an e-mailed statement. Permission was granted by the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, it said.
The physical UN-certified emission reduction credits that Lehman will trade are issued for projects that reduce carbon dioxide emissions and are regulated under the “clean development mechanism” of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.
“The global carbon market is rapidly taking shape as national markets are developing and connecting through the global CER market,” Laurent Segalen, global head of carbon emissions in London, said in the statement.
The bank is seeking CERs in China, India and Latin America, supported by its carbon trading desk in London, the statement said.
Sales in Japan could amount to about 500 million tons of credits in the five years through 201, as the nation seeks to meet its Kyoto Protocol target, Segalen said by telephone yesterday. The price of CERs for 2008 were at 15.90 euros ($23.58) a ton yesterday, according to the Nord Pool exchange in Lysaker, Norway.
Lehman may also divert CERs to Europe, if prices and demand surge there, Segalen said.
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