Image via WikipediaSuspicion that carbon trading system is not secure enough remains after cyber attacks
Attempts to end the chaos inside Europe's emissions trading scheme (ETS) stumbled today when the market reopened, only for minimal trading to take place.
Traders were said to be worried that business could remain polluted by the theft of carbon credits in Austria and elsewhere that forced a shutdown of the scheme on 19 January, at the estimated cost of £90m in lost business.
The European commission has called on national carbon registries to beef up their IT security systems, but has upset traders by declining to publicly reveal the minimum standards now required.
The ETS is seen as a vital tool in the fight against climate change and the fraud is a setback to attempts to sell the cap-and-trade scheme to the US, Australia and elsewhere.
Britain, France and three other countries resumed trading but it took three hours before any trades had been reported on the Paris-based BlueNext platform, while larger exchanges such as that of London-based ICE remained shut.
New York's Green Exchange, backed by JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs, also remained closed for business, with officials there saying it could weeks before they felt confident the system had been suitably cleansed.
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