Fair trade?

摘要

Is the worst financial storm in nearly 80 years having a deleterious effect on climate policy? It seemed that way last week, when European Union (EU) leaders failed to agree on a new set of market-based tools to cut the bloc s greenhouse-gas emissions by at least 20% from 1990 levels by 2020. Proponents could not overcome resistance from a group of countries, led by Poland, that argued that the plan would harm their national economies - an argument apparently given extra weight by the near-collapse of worldwide financial markets and the prospect of a deep economic downturn. At issue was a set of amendments to the EU s mandatory carbon emissions trading system. In the first phase of this scheme, implemented in 2005, emissions allowances were given to industry for free - and, in retrospect, in far too great an abundance. The resulting oversupply led to a very low price, and a corresponding failure to deliver the desired emissions reductions. The proposed amendments would require large facilities to bid for 100% of their emissions allowances at auction.