بخشنامه تجاری اثرات انتشار کربن EU در صنایع انرژی بر - تجزیه و تحلیل اقتصاد خرد نشان می دهد

The cost impacts from the European emission trading system (ETS) on energy-intensive manufacturing industries have been investigated. The effects consist of direct costs associated to the CO2 reduction requirements stated in the EU Directive, and of indirect costs of comparable magnitude that originate from a higher electricity price triggered by the ETS in the power sector. The total cost impacts remain below 2% of the production value for most industries within the ETS in the Kyoto period. In the post-Kyoto phase assuming a 30% CO2 reduction, the total cost impact may raise up to 8% of production value in the heaviest industry sectors. In steel and cement industries the cost impacts are 3–4 fold compared to the least affected pulp and paper and oil refining. Electricity-intensive industries outside the ETS will also be affected, for example in aluminum and chlorine production the indirect cost impacts from ETS could come up to 10% of production value already in the Kyoto period. As industry sectors are affected differently by the ETS some correcting mechanisms may be worthwhile to consider in securing the operation of the most electricity-intensive sectors, e.g. balancing taxation schemes that may include as income source a levy on the wind-fall profits of the power sector due to ETS. A future improvement in ETS for industries within the scheme could be scaling of the emission reduction requirement so that the relative total emission reduction costs are at about the same level.

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) from year 1992 initiated global cooperation on mitigating climate change through stabilizing the man-made greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, 1997). The so-called Kyoto Protocol was signed in 1997 as a result of the UNFCCC aiming at reducing the developed country (so-called Annex 1) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 5.2% from the 1990 level by 2008–2012 through the protocol. The Kyoto Protocol allows using supplemental instruments in addition to domestic measures in meeting the targets, namely so-called flexible mechanism which include Joint Implementation (JI), Clean Development Mechanisms (CDM) and Emission Trading (ET). The Kyoto Protocol has entered into force in 2005, i.e. it's legally binding. USA and Australia have not ratified the Protocol. The European Union has committed to an 8% emission reduction where the obligation has been distributed among the member states. To enforce the implementation of the Kyoto targets, the EU launched the Emissions Trading Directive in 2003 in which plant-specific CO2 caps were introduced to the larger energy production and energy-intensive industry sectors (e.g. cement, oil refining, pulp and paper, steel), i.e. the big GHG emitters (European Union, 2003). Around 45% of the EU's total CO2 emissions are covered by the Directive (European Commission, 2005a). Each member state allocated from its own emission quata a certain amount of CO2 allowance units which were allocated to the industries belonging to the reach of the Directive corresponding to their initial emission levels. The facility specific allowed CO2 emissions are thus bound to the emission permits. For the period 2005–2007 at least 95% of the national allowances had to be distributed free of charge, 2008–2012 this drops to 90%. For the trading period 2005–2007, a total of 6572.4 million tCO2 emission allowances have been allocated. The number of emission allowances to be allocated freely will most likely decrease over time in order to meet the ultimate targets of GHG reductions which may call for up to 70% reductions in global CO2 emissions (European Union, 2003). The EU emission trading system (ETS) established enables trade with the emission allowances and their price has varied between 8 and 30 €/tCO2. Companies not being able to present adequate number of emission allowances vis-à-vis realized emissions are subject to a 40 €/tCO2 penalty which will increase to 100 €/tCO2 during the 2008–2012 period. The companies can employ the flexible mechanisms in this context to reduce their emission burden. For industries within the ETS, the EU cap-and-trade scheme imposes extra costs and may in worst place even affect the competitiveness of energy-intensive industries in Europe. On the other hand, ETS allows companies to use credits from Kyoto's project-based mechanisms and the EU market for emission trading created may offer an effective way for EU Members to reduce emissions. These questions are most topical now when the EU is planning the post-Kyoto targets for GHG reductions. Initial talks hover around 15–30% reductions by 2020. Therefore investigating the economic impact of the ETS for the energy-intensive industries is highly justified. The economic impacts of the Kyoto Protocol on macro scale and on the power sector have been discussed in previous papers (Bode, 2006, International Energy Agency, 2000, Johnson and Heinen, 2004, Khanna, 2001 and Zhu and van Ierland, 2006). The carbon emissions of manufacturing industries in different countries are also well known (Schipper et al., 2001). In this paper a comprehensive analysis is presented on the cost effects of the Emission Trading Directive on energy-intensive industries starting with the Kyoto level and moving then to more stringent cases. The approach is based on micro-economic analyses in which the ETS is turned into a new expense for the industry and this is compared to other relevant expenses and figures of merit. The focus is on heavy and energy-intensive industries and in particular the sectors covered by the ETS. Only primary cost effects from ETS are considered, i.e. effect on the price of purchased electricity and the direct CO2 emission reduction cost. Secondary effects such as possible price increases in raw materials or in other input factors were not considered here

In this paper the cost impacts from the European emission trading system (ETS) on energy-intensive manufacturing industries have been investigated. The impacts were split into direct and indirect costs. The former refers to the direct costs of the CO2 reduction requirements as stated in the Directive. The indirect cost arises from the electricity price increase caused by the ETS in the power sector thus causing an extra expense in electricity-intensive heavy industries. In the examples of this paper an elasticity value of 0.5 €/MWh per 1 €/tCO2 was used as the theoretical upper limit being about double (coal condensing power). The CO2 reduction costs were described by the price of the emission allowance units (EAU) which set the upper limit to emission costs. The industry sectors covered by ETS will experience both the direct and indirect costs from the carbon emission restrictions. One of the main findings of the paper is that the ETS influences the industry sectors quite differently. The indirect expenses from electricity price increases to energy-intensive industries may be considerable and comparable to the direct emission reduction costs. In the Kyoto period, the total cost impacts remain below 2% of the production value for most industries within the ETS. The exception is the very electricity-intensive industry sectors where the cost increase may even jeopardize profitability if all electricity is purchased from the open market. In the post-Kyoto phase assuming a 30% CO2 reduction obligation, the total cost impact may raise to 8% of production value in the ETS heavy industry sectors. In the most electricity demanding sectors the indirect price increase in electricity may come up close to the profit level of the industries. The study shows that the pulp and paper and oil refining are least affected by the ETS and even a year 2020 CO2 reduction level would correspond well under 2% of the production value. The largest impacts are to be found in the steel and cement industries, or at least 3–4 fold cost effects compared to the least affected industries. Electricity-intensive industries outside the ETS will be affected as well. In copper and stainless steel the cost effects from possibly higher electricity price would remain under 1% of production value even in 2020. But very electricity-intensive industries such as aluminum, chlorine and silicon would already during the Kyoto period experience new expenses around 10% of production value, and in 2020 well beyond 10%, respectively. In these cases, profitability may be on cut. The fact that the price formation mechanisms of electricity may transfer the price of EAUs into all electricity prices means a huge profit to electricity producers with low carbon context but a huge expense to large electricity consumers. The impact of the electricity increase due to ETS varies from industry to industry but could mean a double burden to industries within the ETS. As the purpose of the ETS is in reducing CO2 emissions and not in creating so-called wind-fall profits to utilities, some correcting mechanisms would be worthwhile to consider in securing the operational conditions of most electricity-intensive sectors. Different taxation schemes could be employed in this case or considering re-allocation of the EAUs within the national allowance quota, for example granting traditional fossil-free power producers less and the electricity-intensive industries more EAUs. The study shows clearly that industry sectors are differently affected by the ETS, even if neglecting the indirect cost component. Therefore, when considering a future emission trading system, a possible improvement could be achieved by introducing a normalization factor to account for the differences in the industries. Instead of using a constant percentage for the emission reductions in all industry sectors, the emission reduction requirement could be scaled to keep the relative total emission reduction costs at about the same level in all industries.