Tag: carbon tax

Europe is staring at a ‘lost decade’ that will make decarbonisation impossible and reduce carbon credits to the value of ‘junk bonds’ unless politicians back a carbon market reform package, the head of Europe’s electricity industry association has told EurActiv.

France's conservative government is including a new one-off carbon levy in its €11 billion cuts package, but weakening growth may spell even more belt-tightening to meet sacrosanct deficit targets.

The British government is "highly likely" to block European Commission proposals for a carbon tax contained in a widely-circulated draft version of the Energy Taxation Directive, EU diplomatic sources said yesterday (12 April).

'Don't tax what you earn, tax what you burn' should be the EU's response to safeguarding our welfare societies, EU Climate Action Commissioner Connie Hedegaard told EurActiv in an interview, expressing support for an EU carbon tax. She spoke about progress in international climate negotiations and the EU's efforts to stay ahead of the game.

Proposals for a European carbon tax have been kicked into the long grass following a debate between EU commissioners, who face divisions between member states whilst the effects of the financial crisis are still being felt.

The EU could cut emissions by 30% by 2020 without incurring any additional costs, according to Niklas Höhne, director of energy and climate policy at renewable energy consultancy Ecofys. But the switch to a higher target needs to be balanced across sectors, he told EurActiv in an interview.

France will seek an agreement with the US on a carbon border tax and is convinced that other EU states will come on board if Washington supports it, according to French Environment Minister Jean-Louis Borloo. EurActiv France reports.

France will delay implementing a domestic tax on carbon dioxide emissions until it can secure an agreement with its European partners, Prime Minister François Fillon signalled on Tuesday (23 March).

Stricter caps on greenhouse gas emissions and a price 'floor' are needed to deliver green investment, an influential parliamentary committee in the UK said yesterday (8 February), calling on the government to intervene.

The results of the Copenhagen conference on climate change have produced mixed feelings among leaders and nations. Christian Egenhofer and Anton Georgiev, researchers at the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), clarify in a December paper the implications of the accord for climate change, global governance and the EU's world leadership role.

European Commission plans to introduce minimum EU-wide CO2 tax rates could be "counter-productive" at this stage as member states have not had enough time to implement measures to cut emissions from sectors that do not participate in emissions trading, according to European businesses.

The European Commission's plans to introduce an EU-wide carbon tax to leverage money for financing a post-Kyoto climate treaty received a positive but cautious welcome from finance ministers last week.

Experts from the 27-member bloc agreed on a list of industries ranging from plastics manufacturing to iron and food processing that will be largely exempted from CO2 trading after 2013 for fears that their inclusion would move production abroad.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy repeated calls to impose a European tax on goods imported from countries with less stringent environmental laws as he outlined plans for a new carbon tax on French households and industries last week (10 September).

The French government has set the ball rolling to introduce a carbon tax in 2011, anticipating support for Sweden's plans to make implementing such a scheme at EU level the priority of its upcoming six-month turn at the bloc's helm.

"A cap & trade system remains the most suitable tool to address emissions reductions worldwide in comparison with carbon taxation," writes Maïté Jaureguy-Naudin, a researcher at the French Institute of International Relations (IFRI), in a March paper.

The EU's energy intensive industries are trying to get a "free lunch" in the EU's climate change agenda by making false claims and creating excessive "hype" about the threat of delocalisation or "carbon leakage", writes Green MEP Claude Turmes ahead of the upcoming Council summit.

An announcement by Commission President José Manuel Barroso that new climate change legislation, due to be presented today (23 January), could require exporters in countries with lax climate policies to buy EU pollution permits if they wish to trade within the bloc has infuriated the UK and US governments.

On 26 June, panellists from a range of sectors debated the role of regulation, fiscal incentives, consumers and other issues related to the transformation of the EU's energy market in light of climate-change and energy-security concerns.

Trade Commissioner Mandelson has attacked a plan supported by France and Industry Commissioner Verheugen to impose taxes on imported goods from countries that have not ratified the Kyoto protocol.