CLIMATE CHANGE/ETS : ENVI COMMITTEE SUPPORTS BUT LIMITS ALLOWANCE BACKLOADING.

The European Parliament's Committee on the Environment (ENVI) backs the European Commission's proposal to postpone the auctioning in the framework of the EU's Emissions Trading System (ETS) of 900 million emission allowances (backloading) for the 2013-2020 period (third ETS trading period). ENVI, the lead committee on this issue, adopted, on 19 February, a report by Matthias Groote (S&D, Germany) in a vote of 38 to 25 with two abstentions. It contradicted the Committee on Industry and Energy (ITRE), which on 24 January adopted a non-binding opinion on this proposal, causing an immediate further drop in the price of a tonne of CO2 (see Europolitics 4572).

These two contradictory votes illustrate the sharp division in Parliament on this question. The fate of Groote's proposal to ask the ENVI committee for a mandate to begin negotiating with the Council right away is also telling. MEPs, on a proposal from Chris Davies (ALDE, UK), decided to postpone by a week the decision either to give the rapporteur a mandate or to submit the Groote report to a vote in plenary first. This extra time may be used to try to work out a compromise with ITRE on the EP's position. If this effort fails, it will be for the plenary to decide. In that case, the debate is likely to be particularly intense.

Approving the allowance backloading should not translate into giving the Commission a blank cheque. In an amendment tabled by the ALDE, S&D, Greens-EFA and GUE-NGL groups and adopted, MEPs limit such a measure. They state that the Commission can, in "exceptional" circumstances, adapt the auction timetable provided that an impact study shows that the sectors concerned will not be confronted with a "significant risk" of relocation of companies outside the EU. Another restriction is set: "the Commission should be able to make no more than one such adaptation and only during the eight-year period beginning on 1 January 2013". MEPs insist that the measure "should be considered a short-term action, rather than a structural measure intended to...