Songdo International Business District in South Korea has been selected by the board of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) to hold its secretariat. This fund was launched last year with the aim to channel aid to poor, vulnerable countries through public and private investments. South Korea was also in the news recently for new legislations limiting the emissions of carbon dioxide and introducing a cap-and-trade scheme. Read more

S. Korea to host secretariat of UN climate fund

20 October 2012:

SEOUL: South Korea on Saturday won a bid to host the secretariat of a United Nations fund aimed at helping fight global warming, President Lee Myung-Bak announced.

The 24-member board of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) selected Songdo International Business District in the western port city of Incheon to house its secretariat.

“We’re very pleased to host the GCF secretariat,” Lee told journalists, adding the GCF has the potential to grow into “one of the world’s largest international agencies”.

The vote came at the end of a three-day GCF board meeting in Incheon.

The fund was launched at a UN climate conference in Durban, South Africa, last year to help channel up to US$100 billion a year in aid to poor, vulnerable countries by 2020 via investments from both public and private sources.

South Korea had been competing with five other countries — Germany, Switzerland, Mexico, Namibia and Poland. Five rounds of voting were held to decide who would host the secretariat.

Source: www.channelnewsasia.com

(Songdo, 20 October 2012) – The Board of the Green Climate Fund selected by consensus Songdo,

Incheon City, Republic of Korea as the host city of the Green Climate Fund. Six countries made

high quality bids. The Board expressed its appreciation to the six countries for submitting their

offers.

This decision of the Board was adopted at the second Board meeting that will conclude today in

Songdo and was adopted by consensus following a confidential ballot process. The decision is the

outcome of an open and transparent process that the Board had initiated at its first meeting in

Geneva, Switzerland, in August 2012. The decision will be presented for endorsement to the

Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

(UNFCCC) at its upcoming eighteenth session to take place on 26 November–7 December 2012 in

Doha, Qatar.

More information about the Green Climate Fund is available on the Fund’s website

http://www.gcfund.net

South Korea doubles 2013 emission cut target

16 October 2012:

South Korea will ask companies to cut greenhouse gas emissions by a combined 17.2 million metric tons next year, equivalent to a 3 per cent reduction and twice as much as this year’s target.

The guidelines assume that the 377 companies subject to quotas would emit 570.6 million tons of carbon dioxide next year if there is no program to curb emissions, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy said in an e-mailed statement. The government has asked companies to reduce emissions by 8 million tons this year.

Posco, Asia’s third-biggest steelmaker by output, was given the largest reduction target at 2.48 million tons, followed by Hyundai Steel Co. with 487,000 tons and Ssangyong Cement Industrial Co. with 443,000 tons, according to the statement. The government plans to impose fines from 2014 on companies that fail to meet their quotas.

South Korea, the world’s eighth-largest greenhouse gas emitter, is mapping out regulations to boost participation by companies in curtailment efforts. The government pledged in 2009 to limit the country’s total emissions by 2020 to 30 per cent below the estimated level it would have reached with no reduction plan.

The government also passed a bill in May to establish a cap-and-trade program in 2015, a market-based system that requires companies exceeding their emission quotas to buy permits from those that discharge less.

Source: www.theage.com.au