Brussels, 13/11/2012 (Agence Europe) - What should be expected from the announcement made by Connie Hedegaard to stop the clock in ETS for a year? This brings us back to the question of the feasibility of her proposal and the results sought by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) to reduce CO2 emissions overall from aviation over the next year (see EUROPE 10726).
Backloading. This effective deferral only affects flights from and to the EU. Intra-European flights will still be subject to the usual rules of the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). For exempted flights, carbon quotas will not have to be submitted in April 2013 as planned. If a global agreement is not obtained at the ICAO during its autumn council in a year's time, the system will resume and airlines will pay their allowances for these non-EU flights in April 2014 on the basis of 2013 emissions. There will not be any retroactive effect if the scheme is identical for all flights. This means that they will not pay for their 2012 emissions, whether there is an agreement or not, explained a source at the Commission. Allowances “offered” by the Commission would also disappear for international flights. Free quotas already obtained will have to be surrendered and others will not be granted.
Political framework in a year. The same source explained that this deferral of April 2012 is aimed at providing a boost to negotiations and consolidating a constructive spirit. During the ICAO General Assembly on Friday 9 November, member countries were very keen to negotiate, including India, China, Brazil and the US. The high level group set up is expected to work on the drawing up of an international framework for reducing CO2 emissions in aviation on the basis of market mechanisms. This is the EU's preferred approach, which advocates a global system and not the addition of regional systems, including “departing” flights. This European official also pointed out that negotiations at a political level still remained.
Co-decision agreement in April. The Council and the European Parliament, however, will, above all, have to approve the Commission amendment on this issue by April, when airlines have to surrender their allowances. The Commission will insist that other amendments are included, such as backloading for intra-European flights.
Cautious and mixed responses. The Parliament has displayed a number of reservations in this regard. The chairman of the Parliamentary committee responsible for climate change, Matthias Groote (S&D, Germany) declared that he was cautiously optimistic about the positive message sent out by the ICAO. The rapporteur on the legislation that is expected to be amended, Peter Liese (EPP, Germany), spoke about the co-decision process that will soon begin and warned that it is now clear that we have to be flexible. Nonetheless, we have to analyse the Commission proposal closely. We shouldn't be overgenerous and we should attempt to prevent distortions of competition as much as possible. This is exactly what the European regions airline association (ERA) and the International Air Transport Association (IATA) are saying. Both organisations regret that the scheme is only being applied to two thirds of all flights and “the Commission has created a compromise that unfairly penalises many European carriers operating intra-EU flights and their passengers”, explained Sylviane Lust, Director General of IACA. Her association and ERA are hoping that the member states and European Parliament agree on a moratorium for all flights. The Association of European Airlines (AEA) cautiously welcomed the Commission announcement and said that it was, above all, relieved that the tensions and threats of retaliation were now much more removed. Finally, Tony Tyler, head of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), simply described the Commission decision as “pragmatic” and said it recognises that there has been progress towards a solution for managing carbon emissions from aviation, particularly by his own organisation. (MD/transl.fl)