Parliament adopts CO2 market stability reserve
Publicat de Cosmin Meca, 9 iulie 2015, 13:29 / actualizat: 30 ianuarie 2021, 10:59
A reform of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), informally agreed with the Latvian Presidency of the Council, was endorsed by Parliament on Wednesday. The reform is intended to reduce the surplus of carbon credits available for trading in order to support the price of the emission rights. The scheme will start operating in 2019.
The new law creates a system that will automatically take a portion of ETS allowances off the market and place it in a reserve if the surplus exceeds a certain threshold. In the opposite scenario, allowances could be returned to the market. The surplus of emission allowances, which has been building up in the system since 2009, is estimated at over 2 billion.
Under the deal, „backloaded” allowances (900 million allowances withdrawn from the market at least until 2019), will be placed in the reserve.
Any remaining allowances not allocated by the end of the current trading phase (2020) should also be placed in the reserve, subject to an overall review of the ETS directive, to be tabled by the Commission this year.
The Market Stability Reserve will start operating earlier than initially foreseen, on 1 January 2019, instead of 2021 as proposed by the Commission.
Before coming into force, the legislation is to be approved by the Council of ministers in September.
