MEPs prepare to vote on EU carbon border

MEPs are set to vote on a proposed EU carbon border during the full plenary of the parliament planned in a month's time.

Members of the parliament's committee on environment, public health and food safety endorsed the proposal by 58 votes to eight, with ten abstentions, on Friday and the matter is expected to be voted on by the full plenary during the session planned from March 8-11, with legislators at the European Commission expected to present a proposal before July.

The environment committee members said the carbon border should be used to extend the greenhouse-gas-abatement requirements applied to EU businesses by the bloc's emissions trading system – the EU ETS – to all companies which export goods and commodities into the region.

Committee members said the emissions levy to be applied to goods at a proposed, World Trade Organization-compliant carbon border should be linked to the carbon price determined by the EU ETS and should encompass, by 2023, the power sector and the bloc's most carbon intensive industries, including cement, steel, oil refining, aluminum, paper, glass, chemicals and fertilizers.

Green Party MEP for West France Yannick Jadot said the proposed EU carbon border adjustment mechanism, or CBAM, will offer “a major political and democratic test for the EU, which must stop being naïve and impose the same carbon price on products, whether they are produced in or outside the EU, to ensure the most polluting sectors also take part in fighting climate change and innovate towards zero carbon.”

Jadot added: “Parliament is leading the way and we expect the same level of ambition from the commission and member states.”