Abuse and Incompetence

... in the fight against global warming, says journalist Nick Davies of the Guardian.

The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), which is supposed to offset greenhouse gases emitted in the developed world by selling carbon credits from elsewhere, has been contaminated by gross incompetence, rule-breaking and possible fraud by companies in the developing world, according to UN paperwork, an unpublished expert report and alarming feedback from projects on the ground.

Three of the companies (of only 17 in the world) that monitor carbon credits have failed spot checks, and up to 1/3rd of the credits in India were wrongly approved. In one organization's case, the findings "were so bad that the board considered suspending its right to work."

An inside source told the guardian that there were "all kinds of basic errors which make you wonder if they have any idea what they're doing."

[An expert adviser] found evidence of projects supplying false information which was then accepted by the companies who were supposed to check it. In one case cited in the report, he accuses an Indian company of making statements which were "blatantly false".

The Whole Story Here.