China quake may impact 5 pct carbon offsets-Lehman

VENICE, May 15 (Reuters) - China's deadliest earthquake in decades could impact up to 5 percent of the country's supply of carbon offsets under the Kyoto Protocol over the 12 months, a market which China dominates, Lehman analysts said on Thursday.

Developing nations are projected to sell around 540 million tonnes carbon offsets called CERs (certified emissions reductions) annually through 2012, and China will corner 270 million tonnes of that, UN data suggest.

Some 15 million tonnes of carbon offset production, worth up to 250 million euros ($387.5 million) in the secondary market, were within a 150 kilometre radius of Monday's quake centred in the southwest Sichuan province, Lehman said.

"We counted seven companies impacted among the world's top 20 project developers," said Laurent Segalen, Lehman head of emissions trading, who listed EcoSecurities (ECO.L: Quote, Profile, Research), Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research), Endesa (ELE.MC: Quote, Profile, Research) and Mitsubishi Corp (8058.T: Quote, Profile, Research) among developers with nearby projects.

The quake could also harm monitoring of emissions cuts, a required step before projects can claim their offsets, adding to the uncertainty of the scale of impact, Segalen said.

Separately project developer Tricorona said that it had over 10 offset projects in Sichuan that were feared to have been affected, and which corresponded to about 8 million emission cuts through 2012. (Reporting by Gerard Wynn; additional reporting by Michael Szabo and Chris Wills in London; editing by James Jukwey)