Joint position – Two concrete proposals to make European emissions trading work for cement

Unfortunately, the EU’s ETS track record on cement is poor.

Traditional clinker production is responsible for around 90% of cement’s emissions. It would be logical to have legislation promoting the reduction of clinker. However, this is not the case for the EU ETS as the main benchmarks for grey and white cement are expressed in free allowances per ton of produced clinker. Consequently, if cement companies reduce their clinker production in favour of cementitious materials, they would get fewer allowances. This creates poor incentive in the EU’s climate policy framework, jeopardising the decarbonisation and future competitiveness of the most consumed material on the EU’s single market.

This joint position paper looks at three interlinked problems: overallocation, violation of the ‘one product, one benchmark’ principle, and counterproductive activity level regulation. To address these problems and make the EU ETS a driver of decarbonisation and competitiveness, our alliance also proposes concrete solutions:

• Maintain the phase out of the free allocation;
• Shift from a clinker to a cement benchmark.

Read more.