Emissions Trading: reduced allocation of free allowances for new entrants

The European Commission adopted new measures to implement the judgment issued last April 2016 by the Court of Justice.

As reported in our previous  article, the judgment had invalidated the cross-sectoral correction factor (CSCF) used to allocate free allowances from 2013 to 2020 to stationary installations in the scope of EU-ETS, granting 10 months to the Commission to establish a new amount.

The recently approved Decision (linked at the bottom of this article), defines the new CSCF to be applied to all new allocations adopted after 1 March 2017: new entrants installations and increased capacity of existing ones will receive a reduced free allocation of about 5% compared to the current system.

As defined by the judgment, recalculations will not affect the allocations already approved, that will remain unchanged, except in case of variations in activity or capacity levels, as already defined by the current Regulation on monitoring and reporting of greenhouse gas emissions.

As already provided in Directive 2009/29/EC, the allocation of free allowances for district heating and high-efficiency cogeneration is not subject to the CSCF.

In the short term this Decision is not expected to have a material impact on carbon market.

The new correction factor will not be applied to the allocations in the period 2021 – 2030, that will follow the stricter linear reduction factor currently discussed in the European Parliament.

 

Link to the full text of the Decision (EU) 2017/126: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=uriserv:OJ.L_.2017.019.01.0093.01.ENG&toc=OJ:L:2017:019:TOC


Emissions Trading: free allowances to 2020 shall be re-determined

On 28th April 2016 the EU Court of Justice declared invalid the maximum annual amount of free allowances for greenhouse gas emissions determined by the Commission for the period 2013-2020.

The judgment is a consequence of the legal actions that a number of companies included in the scope of ETS brought before the courts in Italy, the Netherlands and Austria against the National Authorities entrusted with the allocation of GHG allowances. The subject of dispute was the calculation method applied to define the maximum annual amount of allowances.

As a consequence, the Cross Sectoral Correction Factor (CSCF) applied to preliminary allocations with Decision 2013/448/EU is not valid and shall be re-calculated on the basis of new data to be provided by the Member States; the maximum annual amount of allowances could be higher or lower than that thus far determined by the Commission.

The Commission is granted 10 months to establish a new amount, whereas the previous allocations of allowances cannot be called into question.

The full text of the judgment is available on the CURIA website http://curia.europa.eu/juris/celex.jsf?celex=62014CJ0191&lang1=it&type=TXT&ancre=


EED transposed into Italian Regulation

Directive 2012/27/EU was transposed into Italian Decree 102/2014.

Here follow a short review of the main news.

Renovation of public bodies’ buildings will be applied to minimum 3% of the whole area (about 400.000 m2 / year). With a public investment of 355 million euros in the period 2014-2020. The local authorities contribute to achieving the objective.

Purchasing by public bodies will follow the National Green Public Procurement Plan and other National regulations on high energy-efficiency performance of products, services and buildings.

Energy efficiency obligation schemes was set up, confirming the White Certificates as the main system to achieve  cumulative end-use energy savings target by 31 December 2020.

Large Enterprises and energy-intensive enterprises shall carry out energy audits or implement an energy management system. Public funding will be available for SME to voluntary carry out energy audits or implement an EMS.

Energy Performance Contracts are promoted and minimum items to be included are provided.

New buildings and renovation of existing buildings satisfying high energy efficiency standards can benefit from volume bonuses and derogations to urban standards.

The National Fund for Energy Efficiency was established for: a) energy efficiency in public buildings; b) the development of district heating and cooling; c) energy efficiency services and public infrastructure; d) energy efficiency of residential buildings and social housing; e) energy efficiency in the industrial sector.

With this Decree Italy finally gets in line with EED, and provides an allocation of 800 million euros from 2014 to 2020 for energy efficiency.


Digital Venice – #digitalvenice more Digital, more Europe

MR Energy Systems presents @ Digital Venice, 10th of July – 14.30, venue: Telecom Italia Future Centre, session: “Chambers of Commerce for Digital Agenda” title:

Smart objects, smart metering: sustainability and performance digitalization. 

Sustainability needs to be proved with performance indicators. Measuring performances needs the digitalization of physical information. A walk through current trends linking environmental performances with bits and bytes.

 

Portal DIGITAL VENICE: Digital Venice – #digitalvenice more Digital, more Europe

Full event program: http://www.ve.camcom.gov.it/default.aspx?cod_oggetto=10153733

Article on Corriere delle Comunicazioni: http://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/digital-venice/28524_la-camera-di-commercio-l-innovazione-e-nel-dna-della-citta.htm


Innovation in construction sector

Given the importance of this subject, we report here entirely an article published by World Green Building Council as a report of the meeting chaired by WGBC at the European Commission in November 2013. Hope you find it interesting.

What does ‘Innovation’ mean for the construction sector?

Nov 07, 2013

The title of this article was the question posed in the opening plenary of the European Commission’s recent ‘Innovation in Construction’ conference, chaired by the Europe Regional Network.

Opening Plenary of Innovation in Construction Conference

However, this conference wasn’t about dream projects and fanciful concept stage products as the name might suggest to some. It was very much about the hard reality that has stared the sector in the face for a number of years: we need to innovate to ensure the heart of our industry can come off life support and start beating strongly once again.

Antti Peltomäki, Deputy Director-General of DG Enterprise and Industry noted at the outset of the conference that “there is significant pressure for the construction sector to adapt and evolve in the face of high energy prices, environmental concerns and increased competition from non-EU operators”. Indeed, this year’s ‘World Green Building Trends’ report demonstrated that European enterprises are very much in a global green building race, with green building activity on the rise around the world.

Antti Peltomäki, Deputy Director-General of DG Enterprise and Industry speaking at Innovation in Construction

The buzzword of the day was ‘competitiveness’. Pleasingly, the concept of long-term economic competitiveness is becoming increasingly synonymous with that of sustainability in EU construction dialogue. This mainstreaming of sustainability in the wider dialogue about competitiveness was consolidated last year by the Commission’s ‘Strategy for the sustainable competitiveness of the construction sector and it’s enterprises’.

The Strategy is a long-term policy vision for the sector released by DG Enterprise and Industry in summer 2012 that is currently being taken forward by a high level strategic forum and a number of thematic groups. This work sits alongside work by DG Environment on EU sustainable building policy, which the Network has recently responded to in its Sustainable Buildings Paper, setting out a vision for market transformation.

What is clearly agreed across the Commission is that innovating to lead on sustainability will be key to our sector’s long-term competitiveness, at home as well as in an increasingly global market. How we create an EU policy framework that will help transform the market towards sustainability is the big question now.

Another common theme from the day that emerged strongly alongside ‘competitiveness’ was ‘collaboration’, which reflects the key message in our recent report ‘A New Era in Building Partnerships’. The central importance of cross-sector collaboration in achieving more innovative, sustainable and valuable outcomes is a core principle at the heart of Green Building Councils and their whole value-chain member communities. Interestingly, one of the proposals put forwards at the conference was that supply chain collaboration ought to be more explicitly promoted by EU policy.

In conclusion, the conference evidenced a growing belief that innovative short-term thinking is not really true innovation at all, and that partnership is the new leadership when doing business.

The author James Drinkwater is Senior Policy Advisor to WorldGBC’s Europe Regional Network

James Drinkwater speaking at Innovation in Construction

Stefan van Uffelen, Dutch GBC speaking at Innovation in Construction

Antonio Paparella, European Commission speaking at Innovation in Construction

Audience at Innovation in Construction

– See more at: http://www.worldgbc.org/regions/europe/ern-blogs/general/what-does-innovation-mean-construction-sector/#sthash.woLspsmf.dpuf


MR Energy Systems @ Greenbuild Expo 2013 – Philadelphia

MR Energy Systems is exibiting at GreenBuild Expo 2013, the most important Expo on Green Building worldwide, gathering venue for the international LEED community.

MR Energy Systems brings @ Greenbuild its experience in consulting engineering for sustainbale buildings including:

  • LEED – GBC Italia – consulting services
  • Energy Dynamic Symulations
  • Energy monitoring systems, Building Automation Systems, Energy Response Platform
  • Sustainbale materials consulting: LCA, Carbon Footprinting, EPD
  • Strategic consulting, policy analisys & development

Come and meet us together with the other Italian companies at the ICE-Italian Trade Promotion Agency booth # 1011 .
For more information, do not hesitate to contact us: info@mrenergy.it


Ecomondo 2013 – “Carbon Footprint, LCA, Environmental Product Declaration – a path towards sustainable materials””

MR Energy Systems at Ecomondo 2013 presents how to reach important commercial results while abating products environmental impact.

06/11/2013 – 14:30 -17:00  Memo
Venue: Sala Girasole Hall Est lato pad.D7
CITTA´ SOSTENIBILE – Seminar

Edilizia Materiali Qualità Certificazione

A cura di GreenProducts

Ottimizzare il rapporto fra edificio, energia, ed ambiente, rientra nelle finalità dei vari protocolli di qualità e certificazione, conseguentemente i singoli materiali impiegati nella costruzione devono corrispondere a determinati requisiti di sostenibilità.

Programma
Ore 14.00 | Registrazione
Ore 14.30 | Inizio lavori
Prospettive e scenari futuri della certificazione LEED
Mario Zoccatelli – Presidente GBC Italia
Schemi di certificazione: Carbon Footprint, LCA, Environmental Product Declaration
Mauro Roglieri – MR Energy Systems srl – Consigliere GBC Italia
L´evoluzione e la scelta dei materiali nei grandi cantieri LEED
Stefano Ferri – Presidente Polistudio – Consigliere GBC Italia
Qualità Ambientale Interna: requisiti per i materiali basso-emissivi
Francesco Balducci – Responsabile di Laboratorio  Cosmob SpA
La progettazione e scelta dei materiali secondo i criteri di certicazione LEED
Fabio Betti – GreenProducts
Il portale dei materiali per l´edilizia certificata
M. Paolo Semprini . GreenProducts

Ore 17.00 Discussione e Chiusura dei lavori


Our Article on Qualenergia

Quale_Energia1Published on n.2/2013 of Magazine Qualenergia an article by Mauro Roglieri and Iris Visentin about LEED, GBC and more in general aboput the benefetis of adopting sustainability rating systems of buildings to reach CO2 reduction targets.

Full article in Italian: http://www.qualenergia.it/articoli/20130520-green-building-council-il-rating-edificio