Market alone can't halt CO2 emissions: British climate official

0 Comments | AFP, April, 2008

PARIS (AFP) — A top British climate change official backed an embattled European Union scheme Friday to tax industrial carbon emissions, but also allowed for exceptions in highly competitive sectors.

Adair Turner, the newly-appointed head of Britain's Climate Change Committee, also expressed skepticism toward the reliance on industry-wide agreements and new technology favoured by the United States for reducing the greenhouse gases that drive global warning.

"My commission and the British government are in favour of moving quite fast in auctioning the permits [to emit CO2] rather than giving them away for free," as is currently done, he told business leaders and journalists in Paris.

Several major multinationals, including Shell France and cement giant...