With an aim to become a leader in carbon industry, Singapore is on the verge of starting the trade of carbon credits by year-end.

Confirming the development at the Carbon Forum Asia conference, a senior minister of state for trade and industry S. Iswaran said that the nation's forthcoming Singapore Mercantile Exchange (SMX) is "on track for year-end" and will provide "an electronic trading platform for futures and options trading on a diversified range of commodities, including energy, metals, agricultural commodities, currencies, commodity indices and carbon credits".

The carbon projects were a success in past one year. However, if the sources are to be believed, the CDM projects will still be in demand after the completion of 2012.

Henry Derwent, president and CEO, International Emissions Trading Association, said, “What is going to happen in Copenhagen, what sort of deal are we going to get? I would love to believe that we could have a set of numbers, a set of targets for all the developed countries, starting when the current Kyoto protocol targets end in 2012”.

The carbon trading will be supported by $500m and Singapore will become a regional carbon hub, added a source.