Still on Hold – No progress on market mechanisms at Warsaw Climate Conference

Carbon Mechanisms Review 4-2013

December 2013 - This issue of CMR wraps up the Warsaw Climate Summit: Just like last year’s meeting in Doha, this conference did not yield ground breaking results. This holds especially true for the area of market mechanisms, as our authors report. This is complemented by decisions at the national level.

Admittedly, some countries like Sweden and Norway announced purchase programmes for CERs during or after the COP. On the other hand, the German coalition agreement sends discouraging signals: it indicates that Germany will not support any further repair of the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) and advocates a weak EU reduction target for 2030. This fuels fears that the ETS will not recover mid-term, which in turn will keep demand for CERs and ERUs at low levels for years to come.

Where do we go from here? Carbon Markets will certainly play, as our authors argue, a role in the design of the new climate change agreement that is to be negotiated by 2015. Yet design questions will be solved at a very late stage only. What to do in between and how Carbon Markets could impact the outcome of international climate change talks is laid out in our opinion piece.

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