A growing bloc of EU countries is pushing to overhaul—or even scrap—the bloc’s Emissions Trading System (ETS) ahead of this week’s summit, as energy market instability and geopolitical tensions intensify pressure on Brussels’ climate agenda.
The carbon trading scheme is expected to dominate discussions at Thursday’s EU summit, with several governments warning that the system is driving up costs for households and industry.
Polish president Karol Nawrocki has written to Prime Minister Donald Tusk ahead of this, urging him to adopt a position that will “fully protect Poles from the further consequences of climate policy”—perhaps by moving away from the scheme altogether.
Prezydent RP Karol Nawrocki wysłał do Premiera Donalda Tuska stanowisko ws ETS przed czwartkowym posiedzeniem Rady Europejskiej.
20 lat systemu ETS i efekty są jasne: Europa traci przemysł, miejsca pracy i konkurencyjność. Produkcja ucieka poza UE, a globalne emisje… rosną. pic.twitter.com/btsTmYO1GS
Przemysław Czarnek, who was earlier this month announced as the opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party’s candidate for PM, also on Tuesday described leaving ETS as “a real chance to lower electricity and heating bills by even several dozen percent,” adding:
This is a matter of normal life for Poles and the development of entrepreneurship.
🟥 Mówią, że się nie da, że UE nie pozwala. 🔥 My mówimy jasno: dochodzimy do władzy i natychmiast wychodzimy z ETS! To realna szansa na obniżenie rachunków za prąd i ciepło nawet o kilkadziesiąt procent. 📢 To kwestia normalnego życia Polaków i rozwoju przedsiębiorczości -… pic.twitter.com/hBqmziAj19
Critics have long warned about the ETS’s impact on poorer consumers, saying it amounts to a “hefty tax”—and Poland is by no means alone in pushing for an overhaul.
Czech official Karel Havlíček told energy ministers while in Brussels on Monday that “fundamental change to the ETS” is needed, highlighting Italy as “another key ally” in this effort.
Slovak PM Robert Fico also earlier this year urged the European Commission to consider a four- to five-year suspension of the scheme, stressing: “The future of the European Union depends very much on whether we will dogmatically insist on insufficiently considered ambitious climate targets that destroy the strategic European industry, or whether we have the strength and courage to make meaningful reductions.”
And in Germany, the opposition AfD claims ETS should be “buried” because it “has only and exclusively harmed the European nations.”
Michael Curzon is a news writer for europeanconservative.com based in England’s Midlands. He is also Editor of Bournbrook Magazine, which he founded in 2019, and previously wrote for London’s Express Online. His Twitter handle is @MichaelCurzon_.
