Prices for allowances that give utilities and factories the right to pump a ton of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere will climb 20% in the next 12 months, according to Lueder Schumacher, an analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort in London. The reason: governments are handing out fewer certificates in the threeyear programme.

Carbon permits, created to reduce dependence on coal and oil, boosted nuclear plant earnings.

Companies from steelmaker Arcelor Mittal to industrial gas maker Air Liquide face electricity prices that doubled since 2004, a year before the programme.

Permits for 2008 ended last week at 22.78 a tonne, after reaching a 13-month high of 26 on 30 May, according to Amsterdam's European Climate Exchange.

Prices may rise to above 30 by 2009, according to Dresdner Kleinwort's Schumacher. Per Lekander, an analyst at UBS in London, predicts allowances will reach 30 next year. By comparison, certi"cates for the initial, three-year trading phase are almost worthless.

FRENCH POWER FIRM'S VALUE GOES NUCLEAR ELECTRICITE de France (EDF) brie"y overtook Total as the euro region's biggest company by market value after analysts raised their stock price targets on prospects that nuclear power generation will keep growing.

Shares of EDF, whose 58 nuclear plants generate almost half of Europe's nuclear power, rose as much as 5.80, or 7.8%, to a record 79.90 in Paris. The gains lifted EDF's market value to 144bn, exceeding Total for the "rst time.

EDF fell back to close up 2.52 at 76.62 for a value of 139bn, below Total's 41bn.

Kepler Equities raised its EDF price target 31% to 101 on Friday.

UBS published an estimate of 100, and Societe Generale forecast 88. EDF wants to build reactors in the US and UK as atomic power gains favour as a cleaner alternative to coal- and natural gas-"red power plants.