Ahead of the adoption of his opinion on the Review of the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) by the CoR April plenary session, CoR rapporteur Marco Dus, member of Vittorio Veneto Municipal Council, Italy, tells us why, according to him, cities and regions should be better involved in the process of reforming Europe's carbon market.
In your draft opinion, you say that cities and regions should be involved as fully-fledged partners in the process of reforming Europe's carbon market. What are your proposals in that regard and how might cities and regions benefit in practice from the reform?
I propose that the revenue from auctioning emission allowances, or at least part of that revenue, be managed directly by municipalities and regions. By actively involving them, we would provide local authorities with the resources to undertake climate change mitigation, especially in relation to hydrogeological risks, which are increasingly being managed in emergency situations.
The Member States should give serious consideration to the potential of local and regional authorities in this area. Moreover, there are already examples of good use being made of these funds. In Romania, for instance, 122 km of cycle lanes and four metro lines with 45 stations have been part-funded from the sale of carbon credits to Romanian power companies by the government.
In short, our local and regional authorities have already demonstrated a keen environmental awareness, playing a leading role in developing successful initiatives to foster energy efficiency, such as the Covenant of Mayors. Harnessing the potential of municipalities and regions by closely involving them in the climate and environmental policy tools deployed by the EU represents an opportunity for the whole of Europe that should not be squandered.
Indeed, to effectively tackle climate change and achieve the objective of cutting carbon emissions by at least 80% (of 1990 levels) by 2050, continued progress is needed towards a green economy with new opportunities for growth and jobs. In order to achieve this objective in the most cost-effective manner possible, it is essential to support the emissions trading scheme (ETS), which was established by the European Union in line with the Kyoto Protocol. In my opinion, I stress the importance of duly involving local and regional authorities in this area since they have considerable expertise and a frontline role in combating climate change as they are, by their very nature, the authorities closest to the public and the first to manage the response to environmental emergencies.
