Regulatory measures must supplement CO2 pricing to reach climate targets - Greenpeace

In a new report, Greenpeace takes aim at the growing call for increased emissions trading and the use of CO2 pricing as “a panacea for climate protection”. The environmental organisation points to a line in the party platform of outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel ’s CSU/CSU alliance, which calls for expanded emissions trading, as a prime example: “On the way to climate neutrality, we are relying on efficient market-based instruments as key instruments." Expanding European emissions trading to all sectors is also high on the agenda of the free-market FDP. The report, conducted by research group DIW Econ on behalf of Greenpeace, details what it describes as narrow limits of CO2 pricing and finds that, taken by itself, it is by no means sufficient to achieve Germany's climate targets. “The CO2 price is dangerously overestimated in the political debate and misused as an excuse for doing nothing,” says Greenpeace executive director Martin Kaiser. "Those who rely solely on the CO2 price will miss the climate targets," adds Claudia Kemfert, head of Energy, Transport and Environment at DIW and co-author of the study. The study bases its findings on several reasons, including the level of the price. In transport, for example, a tonne of CO2 would have to cost 50 euros today and rise to at least 130 euros by 2030 for the sector to achieve its climate targets. That, however, is not happening, partly because the same political parties that most zealously praise the CO2 price complain the loudest when it leads to intended consequences, such as rising petrol prices, Greenpeace notes.

The German government has put a price on greenhouse gas emissions in the transport and building sectors as a key instrument to help reach its climate targets.