Today the European Parliament will vote on the Commission proposal amending the Emissions Trading Directive (ETS) so as to allow the Commission to withhold emission allowances from the ETS market and increase carbon and energy prices in Europe despite the fact that the 21% reduction target of the ETS will be achieved and despite the fact that we are in a deep economic crisis with 26 million European’s without jobs, 10 million more than in 2008.
The Alliance of Energy Intensive Industries calls upon Members of the European Parliament to follow the opinion of ITRE and the combined majority of Members of ITRE and ENVI which rejected the Commission proposal in the committee votes in January and February and to support Amendment 20 which rejects the Commission proposal.
The Commission proposal is the first step to intervene in Phase 3 of the EU emissions trading system (ETS) by withholding 900 million emissions allowances from the market, with the intention to cancel these in a second step and therewith increasing the existing cap beyond 21%.
While supporting the ETS as a policy instrument to meet the EU’s climate objectives, the Alliance of Energy Intensive Industries is opposed to any modification of the ETS rules which would damage further industry’s competitiveness. The EU must stick to the 2020 target formula agreed upon under the third Climate and Energy package and must not revise it unilaterally unless the carbon leakage issue is solved by a binding international climate agreement.
The proposed interference within the agreed policy framework will simply increase the costs for industry and private consumers. By hampering predictability and by increasing regulatory risk of further intervention, it will also deter investments at a time when the EU economy is struggling to find a way out of the crisis.
Instead, policy makers should focus on the post-2020 policy framework and endeavour to work out a scheme that makes the EU more competitive and ensures affordable energy for the industry.
Please click here for a more detailed recommendation of the Alliance.
The AEII includes 15 European sector federations representing over 30.000 companies and 2.6 million directly employed people:
CEFIC, Cembureau, Cerameunie, CEPI, EuLA, EuroAlliages, Eurochlor, EUROFER, Eurogypsum, Eurometaux, Europia, EXCA, Fertilizers Europe, GlassAlliance, IFIEC.