WRITTEN QUESTION E-2794/03 by Eija-Riitta Korhola (PPE-DE) to the Commission. Publication of the EU's Kyoto target as a five-year moving average.
Date: 2003-09-19
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: Council of the European Union, EC Directive, EU environmental policy, degree of pollution, greenhouse gas, industrial pollution, reduction of gas emissions, tradeable emission permit

27.3.2004

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 78 E/431

(2004/C 78 E/0452)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-2794/03

by Eija-Riitta Korhola (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(19 September 2003)

Subject: Publication of the EU’s Kyoto target as a five-year moving average

The Kyoto Protocol stipulates that compliance with commitments is to be gauged according to the average
for the years from 2008 to 2012. This is reasonable because weather conditions, for example, can have a
great impact on annual emissions, linked among other things to the small quantities of hydroelectric
power generated in dry years. The developments as regards achievement of the Kyoto target by the EU and
its Member States have recently been the subject of conflicting assessments stemming in part from weather
conditions, as mentioned above. The press, to say nothing of the public at large, cannot understand such
fluctuations or ascertain whether the trend after smoothing is encouraging or gloomy.

Has the Commission thought of changing its reporting by publishing, in addition to the annual statistics,
an indication of the distance to target, calculated from a five-year moving average? Does it think that this
would put the public in a better position to understand the real direction in which developments were
moving, viewed over a time span longer than a year?

(2004/C 78 E/0453)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-2795/03

by Eija-Riitta Korhola (PPE-DE) to the Commission

Subject: Emissions trading: problem of period-based allocation

(19 September 2003)

Under the emissions trading directive a firm’s allocation is intended to cover three (first emissions trading
period) or five years (second period). It is thus in the firm’s interest to refrain from selling its unused
portion allowances at the end of an emissions trading period if in that way it can secure an unchanged
amount for the whole of the following five-year period. This likewise creates an incentive (unfortunate
from the environmental point of view) for the firm to postpone environmental investment until the start
of the first period, or beyond the beginning of 2008, to enable it to sell surplus emission allowances in as
many years as possible.

Does the Commission consider the allocation rule described above to be compatible with the single
accounting principle?

Does it believe that, when the directive is reviewed, the allocation rules should be assessed and,
if
necessary, amended in such a way as to ensure that the allocation for a firm selling emission allowances is
altered without delay, in proportion to the quantity offered for sale, in the year following the sale, even
though the emissions trading period might not yet have ended?

Joint answer
to Written Questions E-2789/03, E-2790/03,
E-2791/03, E-2792/03, E-2793/03, E-2794/03 and E-2795/03
given by Mrs Wallström on behalf of the Commission

(7 November 2003)

E-2789/03

The Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period is from 2008-2012, and the Protocol provides that Parties
may bank assigned amount units from 2008-2012 into the next commitment period in the case that
Parties have reached their Kyoto target. The emissions trading Directive (1)
is in line with the Kyoto
Protocol by providing for banking of allowances by persons from the 2008-2012 period into the next
period.