The Kyoto balance: Saved by the AAUs

While there will be more carbon credits than covered emissions in Kyoto's first commitment period (2008-12), a number of countries struggle to meet their targets. In this CMA, we quantify the effects of domestic emissions trading, non-trading policies, sinks and planned credit purchases, and identify the countries with credit shortages. We then ask whether our latest CDM/JI supply projections would cover the total credit demand, including the residual needs of short countries, EU ETS banking to Phase 3 and aviation. Finally, we assess the conditions under which countries with surplus AAU may affect the credit supply/demand balance, and provide our best estimate of realistic AAU supply for the first Kyoto period.