RED.L Regulatory News (RED)

13 Nov 2007 07:02

Camco International Ltd13 November 2007 Camco and Pioneer Carbon sign innovative China stove agreement The Camco Group (Camco) and Pioneer Carbon (Pioneer), two pioneering businessesin the sustainable energy and low carbon markets, are pleased to announce thesigning of a memorandum of understanding and cooperation with Beijing ShenzhouDaxu Bio-energy Technology Company Ltd and the Government of Yanqing County. Camco and Pioneer will provide carbon financing and project development supportto the Daxu community household stove replacement programme within YanqingCounty, 60km from Beijing, and will have exclusive rights to the carbon creditsproduced. Although many parts of rural China have access to mains electricity, mostfamilies still cook and heat their homes using stoves that burn coal or wood.This has led to severe deforestation and contributed significantly to greenhousegas emissions. Coal use in particular causes poor air quality in much of China.Crop waste, widely available in many rural areas, could provide an alternativesource of fuel for cooking. The Daxu stove design won the Enterprise Award in this year's Ashden Awards forSustainable Energy, presented by Al Gore. The stove, used for both cooking andheating, is over 40%-efficient and reduces carbon dioxide emissions by about 8tonnes per year. It is specifically designed to use compressed crop waste in theform of briquettes. It combusts the fuel using a controlled supply of air thatfirst produces a gas, which is subsequently burned in the stove. To date, 17,000 stoves have been installed through a direct subsidy by theCounty. The market barrier to further implementation is the high initial costcompared to coal stoves, so carbon financing will ensure the economic viabilityof the project on a much larger scale. The project partners aim to install over 1 million of these stoves within athree year period saving in the region of 28m tonnes of carbon dioxide emissionsin the first five years. In line with Camco's conservative market reportingpolicy, these tonnes will not be added to the contracted project portfolio untilwe can be reasonably sure that they will be delivered as expected. Camco and Pioneer will initially fund a trial of 400 stoves with the objectiveof proving the carbon savings, ensuring sufficient fuel supply and the assessingthe achievability of getting the project registered under the Clean DevelopmentMechanism (CDM). Following the successful outcome of this first phase, Camco andPioneer will commit to finance a further 20,000 stoves. Jeff Kenna CEO of Camco International said "This project is indicative of theseamless approach we now have to our end to end carbon business where we canprovide our clients with initial consultancy through to carbon creditmanagement. This 3-year programme has potential to rollout on a much largerscale than our current industrial projects. The roll out is similar to aprogramme we pioneered in Ethiopia before CDM existed, where over 1 millionstoves were installed. It's a perfect CDM project with clear environmental,social and economic impact. In addition there is enormous potential forintroducing such technology throughout China, since over 20 million wood andcoal stoves are sold each year. We're delighted to be working in partnershipwith Pioneer Carbon, to use our collective experience in this innovativeproject." Tom Morton, Director of Pioneer Carbon, said: "Having developed our firstefficient cookstove project over 5 years ago, it is exciting to see that thegrowing investment in carbon reductions can now fund projects of this sort ofscale. Pioneer believes that well spent carbon finance, particularly intechnologies such as this, can play a huge part in tackling climate change atthe same time as improving quality of life for millions" Enquiries: Camco International Limited +44 (0) 20 7121 6100Jeff Kenna, Chief Executive OfficerScott McGregor, Chief Financial Officer Camco (China)Mr Alan Ho +86 10 8448 3025 KBC Peel Hunt Ltd (Nominated Adviser) +44 (0) 20 7418 8900Jonathan MarrenDavid Anderson Gavin Anderson +44 (0) 20 7554 1400Ken Cronin/Kate Hill/Daniela Stawinoga Pioneer Carbon Ltd (Nairobi)Tom Morton, Managing Director +254 0 733 622 348 Michael Buick, Communications Manager, Climate Care (sister Company), Oxford. +44 1865 207 012 Notes to editors About Camco The Camco Group is a pioneering business with an outstanding track record in thesustainable energy and low carbon markets. The Group consists of three businesssegments: The Camco carbon assets business is a leading project developer with one of theworld's largest carbon credit portfolios. We partner with companies to identify,develop and manage projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and then arrange the sale and delivery of carbon credits to international compliance buyers and into the voluntary market. The consultancy practice includes ESD, The Edinburgh Centre for CarbonManagement (ECCM), Bradshaw Consulting and ESD Sinosphere. The businessescombine specialist technical, strategic and financial expertise and experienceaccrued over two decades. Camco Ventures works with project and technology developers, early stagebusinesses and investor groups to commercialise climate change mitigation technologies, projects and services. Part of this business is the recently announced Climate Leaders' Joint Venture. About Pioneer Pioneer Carbon is an innovative project developer which was spun out of ClimateCare twelve months ago. Climate Care was a founder of the rapidly growingvoluntary carbon market, with its first carbon trades over ten years ago. It isnow well established in this market and operates what is believed to be theworld's largest retail CO2 offset scheme. Pioneer services all Climate Care'sproject needs, but is also developing new projects and methodologies to providecredits both for other voluntary market retailers and also the compliancemarket. The Daxu project is one of a number of major new project initiatives designed todeliver high quality emissions reductions at significant scale whilstbenefitting local communities and economies. The Beijing Shenzhou Daxu Biomass Energy Technology Company Limited The Beijing Shenzhou Daxu Biomass Energy Technology Company Limited (Daxu) wasestablished by Mr Pan Shijiao in April 2005, for the development andcommercialisation of improved biomass stoves. The company has expanded rapidlyand currently employs 160 people. During 2006/07 it had a turnover of approximately £0.6 million. Production and turnover are growing rapidly. This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange