MEPs push for 2025 carbon market review to boost climate action

(EurActiv, 26 Apr 2016) EXCLUSIVE / The EU’s Emissions Trading System – currently being reviewed – could be revised again in 2025 to bring it in line with stronger international climate targets called for by the Paris Agreement on global warming, under proposals being scrutinised by leading MEPs today (26 April).

If ultimately backed by lawmakers, it opens up the possibility of increasing the ambition of the bloc’s carbon market system, a cornerstone of its fight against climate change, five years ahead of schedule.

This would allow a quicker response to expected increased climate change commitments from world leaders in 2023, at the first ‘global stocktake’ after the UN Climate Change Conference in Paris, COP21, last December.

The ETS is the world’s biggest scheme for trading emissions allowances. Regulated businesses measure and report their carbon emissions, handing in one allowance for each tonne they release.

Best performing companies are eligible for free carbon allowances, which they can sell, and member states auction off allowances to the other companies, which brings governments revenue.

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EurActiv, 26 Apr 2016: MEPs push for 2025 carbon market review to boost climate action