In the fight against climate change, the world's largest CO2 emissions trading system has started in China.
The price for one tonne of the greenhouse gas was 48 yuan (about 6.30 euros) at the start of trading in Shanghai on Friday, according to the state news agency Xinhua.
According to this, more than 2000 companies from the energy sector will initially participate in trading, which are responsible for around four billion tons of CO2 emissions per year, making the People's Republic the largest market for greenhouse gas emissions.
Other branches of industry are to be added later.
According to the US think tank Rhodium Group, China's annual greenhouse gas emissions have recently exceeded the emissions of all developed countries combined.
Trade is intended to help the second largest economy to reduce its emissions and to achieve the climate targets set by state and party leader Xi Jinping.
He has pledged that China will aim to peak its CO2 emissions before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2060.
This means that no carbon dioxide is emitted or the CO2 emissions are fully offset.
It should be stricter later
As part of the new trading program, companies will receive quotas on CO2 emissions, according to Xinhua, and will be able to sell excess emission allowances to those who need more pollution rights. However, experts criticized the fact that the quotas are allocated extremely generously, which initially creates little incentive to reduce emissions. China wants to ensure that companies get used to the system first. It could get stricter later. Several cities and provinces had already started emissions trading in pilot projects since 2013. The national start was delayed.