“20 lost years”

The EU’s proposed emissions trading system (ETS) reform spells 20 lost years for climate protection, Michael Bauchmüller writes in an opinion piece for Süddeutsche Zeitung. According to the proposal, certificates would be put in a “reserve” from 2019 and could be erased for good from 2024, Bauchmüller explains. The scarcity of pollution rights that was intended when the ETS was introduced in 2005 could now be achieved 20 years late, he writes. “Market forces alone won’t lead Europeans the way to the clean future they committed themselves to in the Paris Agreement,” Bauchmüller says, arguing that the time has come for Europe to decide on a fixed carbon price.

Read the commentary in German here.

For background, see the CLEW factsheet Understanding the ETS.