European Emissions Trading - the Business Perspective

Annex I parties to the Kyoto Protocol will commit to reducing the emissions of the basket of greenhouse gases by the equivalent of 135 MtC by the first commitment period of 2008-2012. Within the overall target, the EU has agreed to an average reduction of 8%, although this is subject to burden sharing within an EU "bubble", in which there are substantial differences in Member States' allocations. The instruments for reduction are emissions trading, industrial country joint implementation and clean development mechanism. By their nature, market instruments, such as emissions trading, are reliant upon the efficient operation of the market, which in turn depends upon the full involvement of the maximum number of participants to ensure liquidity. Although emissions trading has been generally welcomed by industry, when the proposals were published, many representative organisations expressed reservations concerning its format and details. The position papers of those organisations reviewed in this article demonstrate that within industry there is a high degree of unanimity on the majority of the critical issues within the current proposal, and agreement on the components that should be included in the final version. If the Commission's ambitious timetable is to be achieved, significant changes will need to be made to the proposal, for it is unlikely to achieve early adoption in its present form, and the longer the process takes, the more the national schemes will have the opportunity to develop and ultimately shape the EU scheme that is eventually agreed. In this respect, there certainly will be "early mover advantage" to those Member States that have or are currently establishing their own schemes, and have the requisite political weight to impose their views.