kyoto protocol, definition of

The sale and purchase of carbon credits or pollution permits through carbon markets.

The practice is designed to help control carbon dioxide emissions by placing a price on a ton of emitted CO2 and providing members of trading schemes with economic incentives to reduce the amount of pollution they produce.

The market is dominated by cap-and-trade schemes, such as the EU's emissions trading scheme, but carbon trading can also refer to the sale of carbon offsets from emission reduction projects.

In theory, carbon trading mechanisms mean that emission reductions are achieved at the lowest possible cost, as businesses will only purchase carbon credits - effectively paying someone else to cut emissions for them - if they can not deliver emission reductions at a lower cost themselves.

• Carbon Offsets, what they are and how they help
  Carbon offsets can help with reducing overall carbon emissions by possibly balancing out the carbon impact on the environment. This article goes into more detail on the subject.

• “THIS AGREEMENT WILL BE GOOD FOR ENRON STOCK!!” (Enron’s Kyoto memo turns 27)
  The Washington Post broke the memo soon after Enron’s demise, showing how Enron was hardly a free-market, capitalistic company in  “[Enron] chairman Pushed Firm’s Agenda With Clinton White House.” Indeed, Enron was “the company most responsible...
• Stern’s Climate Lesson for the Trump Administration
  Countries that might be having second thoughts about the immense damage that net zero climate policies are doing to their economies should be encouraged to follow the United States out of the Paris agreement...
• Climate Change Weekly #465: [Fill in the Blank Climate Crisis] Season Is Here
  Climate realists should gird their loins in preparation for the pending onslaught of stories in the mainstream media proclaiming this or that seasonal weather event is being enhanced by anthropogenic climate change to some degree somehow or other.
• Washington Post: “Less warming, but worse impacts on the planet”
  “People are already dying of climate change right now” - but "accelerating solar and wind" will save us from "the most severe climate change scenarios".
• “THIS AGREEMENT WILL BE GOOD FOR ENRON STOCK!!” (Enron’s Kyoto memo turns 25)
  Dated December 12, 1997, it was written from Kyoto, Japan, by Enron lobbyist John Palmisano in the afterglow of the Kyoto Protocol agreement.
• “THIS AGREEMENT WILL BE GOOD FOR ENRON STOCK!!” (Enron’s Kyoto memo turns 24)
  If implemented, this agreement will do more to promote Enron’s business than will almost any other regulatory initiative outside of restructuring of the energy and natural gas industries in Europe and the United States.
• Until recently, pressure on Australia to drop carryover credits had little impact. But times change | Richard Denniss
  As Australia worries about the growing influence of China, we need the help of Europe and the US more than ever
• China as Climate Change Saviour: The Triumph of Hope Over Experience?
  Credulous Western environmentalists and government officials expect China to play a lead role in “combating” climate change, especially since President Trump withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement...
• Why Prolong the Pain? Countries Must End Harmful Allegiance to Paris Agreement
  The United Nations’ (UN) collective decision, under the Framework Convention on Climate Change, to wage war on fossil fuels required a draconian energy policy...
• How vested interests tried to turn the world against climate science
  For decades fossil fuel majors tried to fight the consensus – just as big tobacco once disputed that smoking kills