An environmental fund has been established by Norway’s process industry, including Statoil, to reduce Norwegian emissions of sulphur. Instead of paying a green tax of NOK 3.09 per kilogram of sulphur emitted, process industry companies began contributing an equivalent amount to the fund from 1 January. The aim is to cut annual sulphur emissions from participants by at least 5000 tonnes in 2010. Norway is thereby moving from passive environmental taxes to a system which gives industries collective responsibility for spending the same money on effective anti-pollution measures. No other country in Europe has adopted this approach at present, claims Terje Palmesen, health, safety and the environment manager at the Mongstad refinery operated by Statoil near Bergen. The board of the fund will make grants to help build desulphurisation plants in the Norwegian process industry.
