This book focuses on the linking of the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) with other independent regional ETS. While rich practical and academic research has evolved on the economic and technical side of ETS linking, political drivers and barriers have so far been underrepresented in this debate. Filling this lacuna and based on international relations theory, existing research and qualitative fieldwork, this book introduces the range of political conditions that influence linking, such as political leadership and stakeholder activity. Specifically, it analyzes which of these aspects have played a role in three different linking activities of the EU: (1) a failed linking attempt: EU ETS–California Cap-and-Trade Program; (2) a successful linking treaty: EU ETS–Switzerland Emissions Trading System; and (3) an agreed-upon but not realized link: EU ETS–Australia Carbon Pricing Mechanism. Through an interrogation of these examples, Dr. Unger concludes that it is not only the technical challenges or the overall economic benefit but rather domestic interests, structural aspects, and external international political developments that have jointly dominated linking activities, especially those in which the EU takes part. This book will be of great interest to scholars and policy-makers working in climate policy and EU environmental politics.

As the world's largest economy, United States is also the largest consumer of fossil energy sources and the largest per capita emitter of greenhouse gases. A newly appointed administration and changed majorities in Congress have created more favourable conditions for federal climate action. As in the European Union, emission trading is a central feature in legislation currently before the US Congress, and has already been implemented at the regional level through the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). Emergence of such trading systems in the US offers the opportunity of a future trading link to the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), which in turn would promise greater diversity of abatement options, improved market size and liquidity, and ultimately a more efficient allocation of resources. Subject to further conditions, existing and proposed trading systems in the US already provide for the unilateral recognition of foreign allowances, including EU ETS allowances (EUAs). Yet a full bilateral trading link allowing open market flows across the Atlantic raises additional challenges. Research has shown that differences in certain design features of ET systems can undermine the benefits of a potential market link. The Waxman-Markey bill shows that few aspects of the trading system outlined in this bill would prompt incompatibility with the EU ETS. In the near term, mitigation targets are significantly weaker than those adopted in Europe, suggesting that carbon prices will initially differ across the Atlantic; yet reduction objectives become more stringent over time, improving the prospects for a functional market link. Monitoring and enforcement structures appear sufficiently effective to afford the necessary confidence in a functioning market. More problematic are generous provisions on the eligibility of domestic and international offsets, and a low trigger price for auctions from a strategic reserve that would increase supply in the market. A US dominant climate concern has centred on the international competitiveness of its domestic industry. A transatlantic market link may be an ambitious challenge.

Anthropogenic Climate Change is one of the biggest challenges of the 21st century and receives more and more international awareness. The central instruments to counter climate change are emissions trading schemes (ETS) to cover GHG emissions. To increase efficiency and to ensure global reduction of emissions damaging to the climate, an international emissions trading scheme would be a rational choice. To establish such a global scheme, political decision makers could follow a bottom-up-approach by linking already existing ETS with each other. The book investigates such linkings of emissions trading schemes, which provide many benefits for the linking partners. As experience shows, although the number of schemes increased in the last decade, only a few linkings were established. Thus, the book answers the question, if and which conditions for states exist to link their emissions trading schemes. .

Given the rapid spread of ETSs in an increasing number of countries and the important role that they are likely to play for the success or failure of the environmental policy in the years to come, this book provides an interdisciplinary analysis of the EU ETS from both the legal and economic perspectives comparing it with the other main ETSs existing worldwide, in order to assess whether the EU ETS has truly represented a prototype for the other ETSs established around the world and to investigate the current perspectives for linking them in the future.Through the years, the EU ETS has progressively gained a paramount position within the EU environmental policy and climate change legislation and currently represents the most striking flagship in this sector, with more than 11.000 installations covered by the scheme. In parallel, the EU ETS has paved the way for the establishment of many other ETSs in several other jurisdictions. Such schemes are now recognized worldwide as the “cornerstones” of the climate change policy.

Both the UK and the EU have pinned much of their climate change policy on the effective opeation of the EU emissions trading system (ETS). Now in its second year the scheme has yet to demonstate that it can deliver the substantial greenhouse gas emission reductions that will form the yardstick of its success. This report examines the proposed revisions to the ETS, which would take effect in the scheme's third trading period, scheduled to last from 2013 to 2020. It is ultimately felt that if the ETS is to live up to its full potential, the aim must be to link it up with emissions trading schemes in other parts of the world so as to make the most of emission reduction opportunities in additional countries and sectors. However, the establishment of such links could prove arduous. It is anticipated that the EU may eventually face stark trade-offs between maintaining the environmental integrity of the ETS and extending its reach.

The first detailed description and analysis of the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme.

The European Union (EU) aims to put Europe on track toward a low-carbon economy. In this striking challenge, the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) has been singled out as the Union’s key climate policy instrument, ultimately aimed as a model for a global carbon market. The learning effect of the EU ETS could thus be tremendous. This study explores how the EU ETS actually works on the ground, affecting corporate climate strategies. It covers general sector responses as well as systematic comparative studies of companies across the sectors. The latter enables improved understanding of causal effects and the role of interaction between different policy instruments and other factors that impact corporate climate strategies. The study explores a broad set of mechanisms at play potentially linking the EU ETS to company climate strategies. These include how corporate norms of responsibility are affected by the EU ETS and how economic incentives provide opportunities for innovation. The book’s main contribution lies in its systematic examination of corporate responses to the EU ETS from a broad empirical and analytical social science perspective covering companies in all main EU ETS sectors: electric power, oil, cement, steel and pulp and paper.