Five EU Member States decide to cancel surplus of Kyoto Protocol units
Published
The governments of Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom overachieve their ambitious targets under the Kyoto Protocol. 634.9 million surplus units for the first commitment period have been or will be cancelled. Significant additional amounts under the second commitment period will be cancelled up to 2020 by several member states as new surpluses emerge due to overachievement.
"By cancelling surplus units we hope to send a strong positive signal of support for an ambitious global climate agreement here in Paris."
Lars Chr. Lilleholt, Minister for Energy, Utilities and Climate (Denmark),
Barbara Hendricks, Federal Environment Minister (Germany),
Sharon A.M. Dijksma, Minister for the Environment (the Netherlands),
Åsa Romson, Minister for Climate and the Environment and Deputy Prime Minister (Sweden),
Amber Rudd, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change (UK).
- Denmark has cancelled a surplus of 3.4 million Kyoto Protocol units (AAU, ERU and CER) from the first commitment period.
- Germany: 228 million assigned amount units (AAU) will be cancelled at the beginning of 2016 due to the decision not to transfer the surplus of the first commitment period to the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. Germany also decided not to transfer the surplus of Clean Development Mechanism and Joint Implementation certificates of the first commitment period to the second commitment period. Germany reaffirms its intention to cancel successively the surpluses of units in the course of the second commitment to the extent it has overachieved its target under European legislation in the non-emission-trading sector.
- The Netherlands has decided to cancel any surplus of AAU in the sectors not covered by the EU ETS during its second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol. The surplus at present is estimated to amount to up to 100 million AAU cumulatively, which represents 11% of its annual emission allocations for these sectors over the period 2013-2020.
- Sweden has cancelled its total surplus of over 51 million AAU and 10 million RMU from the first commitment period. Sweden is planning to cancel the total surplus of units from 2013 under the EU Effort Sharing Decision, and thereby the corresponding amount of AAU from the second commitment period, and will take yearly decisions about cancellation during the commitment period.
- The United Kingdom is committed to cancelling all of its surplus first commitment period AAU, equal to approximately 342.5 million units.
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