The text adopted in trilogue, Sunday morning, acts the gradual abolition of free “polluting rights” allocated to manufacturers and plans to charge the emissions linked to the heating of buildings and road transport.
MO12345LEMONDE with AFP
After around thirty hours of harsh talks, the negotiators of the European Parliament and the Member States of the European Union (EU) concluded an agreement, on the night of Saturday 17 to Sunday 18 December, on a vast Reform of the European carbon market, centerpiece of the climate plan of the twenty-seven. The text must still be adopted by the European Council and the European Parliament.
To cover their CO2 emissions, energy producers and energy -consuming industries (steel industry, cement, etc.) in the European Union must today buy “polluting permit” on the European emission quota market ( ETS), created in 2005 and which applies to 40 % of the continent’s emissions. The total of the quotas created by states drops over time to encourage them to emit less.
The reform, proposed in July 2021 by the European Commission, aimed at strengthening it all outbursts to achieve the ambitious objectives for reducing greenhouse effects from the EU climate plan. According to the agreement reached, the rate of reduction of the quotas proposed will accelerate, with by 2030 a drop of 62 % compared to 2005 (against a previous objective of 43 %) – de facto meaning that the industrialists concerned will have to Obviously decrease their 62 %emissions.
gradual abolition of free emission quotas
The carbon market will gradually extend to the maritime sector, to emissions from intra-European air flights (for which the free quotas currently allocated will be deleted), and from 2028 at waste incineration sites (subject to ‘A favorable study rendered by Brussels).
In return for the establishment of a “carbon tax” at the borders, the EU will gradually eliminate the free emission quotas distributed so far to European manufacturers to allow them to face extra-European competition. At least 48.5 % of these “free polluting rights” will be deleted by 2030 and they will disappear completely by 2034, a calendar which was the subject of a keen show between MEPs and States.
Another controversial point: the Commission proposed to create a second carbon market (ETS2) for the heating of buildings and road fuels. Figured with the social impact of such an additional cost, MEPs argued to reserve this measure first for office and heavy goods vehicles.
In the end, households will pay a carbon price on fuels and on gas or fuel oil heating from 2027, but this price will be capped until 2030, and if the current flambé of energy prices is continued, the application will be repelled by one year. The revenues from this new market will in particular feed a “climate social fund”, with 86.7 billion euros, created to help households and vulnerable companies in the energy transition.