TGO eyes carbon credits
The Thailand Greenhouse Gas Management Organization (TGO) is asking the government to come up with incentives to motivate companies to join carbon credit-related schemes.
TGO senior officer Sumon Sumetchoengprachya said it is studying ways to increase incentives for companies to participate in Thailand's voluntary emission trading scheme (V-ETS).
V-ETS is a cap-and-trade scheme in which a factory can sell their unused allowances to other factories.
"The TGO is discussing with the Energy Ministry about whether the Energy Conservation Foundation of Thailand should financially assist companies to implement energy reduction schemes," said Ms Sumon. It is also proposing the Revenue Department waive taxes for both carbon credit sellers and buyers since the tax break for sellers expired last year.
Six companies signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) yesterday with King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi to develop a measurement,reporting and verification (MRV) system in order to support the V-ETS, which will be implemented in October 2014.
With the MoU, the university will act as an adviser to participating companies to estimate and minimise their energy use. The pilot firms will learn their weaknesses in energy use after conducting energy audits.
The TGO expects the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of each company will be known by this October.
Prasertsuk Chamornmarn, TGO's acting executive director, said GHG emission reporting is essential as Thailand is expected to join other developing countries committed to reducing GHG emissions after 2020.
By 2020, developing countries are required to come up with a mandatory emission reduction target, she said.
Vichai Saksuriya, vice-president for manufacturing at Delta Electronics (Thailand), said 80% of the factory's lights have been changed to energy-saving LEDs. It plans to reach 100% this year.
He said the company aims to increase energy savings by 15% a year.
"We are not a large GHG emitter compared to energy companies, but we aim to be the leader in Thailand in terms of energy saving," said Mr Vichai.
The TGO plans to launch Thailand's voluntary emission reduction (T-VER)schme in October. T-VER allows businesses to sell their excess carbon credits to other businesses.