Carbon Pulse

Entities regulated under Ontario’s cap-and-trade scheme that suddenly face new trading restrictions due to the province’s pending exit of the WCI programme have been advised by North America's main emissions exchange to “take appropriate action” to honour or exit their existing obligations.

UK emitters and other stakeholders may automatically face replacement climate obligations once they exit the EU ETS under Brexit, an industry group has suggested.

EU carbon prices rose more than 2% on Monday, climbing back towards €15 after bearish sentiment from a fresh one-month low plumbed earlier in the day was erased by a bullish auction result.

WCI’s market operators have blocked participants in California and Quebec from trading allowances with Ontario entities following the new provincial leader Doug Ford’s decision to abruptly scrap Ontario’s cap-and-trade scheme and leave the North American programme.

A daily summary of our news plus bite-sized updates from around the world.

The Massachusetts Senate unanimously approved an omnibus clean energy bill on Thursday night that provides for the creation of a market-based mechanism for economy-wide pricing carbon and several other renewable energy goals.

EU carbon prices plunged heavily on Friday to their lowest levels since May 16 as traders sold in anticipation of a pause in the year’s stellar gains ahead of a key option expiry date and as auction volumes approach a record.

Germany is to extend beyond this year a three-year project to support poorer nations on carbon markets, while also opening a tender seeking experts to study EU ETS market liquidity, documents showed.

Ontario will not participate in the next quarterly WCI auction in August, sources told Carbon Pulse, as its new premier announced that his government's first act will be to scrap the provincial cap-and-trade scheme.

Below is a table of the closing prices, ranges and volumes for China's regional pilot carbon markets this week. All prices are in RMB, and volumes in tonnes of CO2e. Data sourced from local exchanges.

This week’s quarterly RGGI auction settled slightly above the secondary market at $4.02/short ton, the market’s operator announced Friday, while compliance buying dropped significantly from the previous sale in March.

The Australian federal government and the Energy Security Board (ESB) on Friday provided fresh details on the country’s proposed National Energy Guarantee (NEG) but refused to discuss the scheme’s overall emissions ambition, which may lead to its ultimate demise.

A court in The Hague on Tuesday sentenced a 46-year-old Pakistani man to eight years in jail over his role in masterminding a €6.5 million tax fraud scheme via the EU ETS.

New Zealand’s opposition leader on Friday backed the establishment of a climate change commission, brightening the outlook for a non-partisan body to set up national carbon budgets and oversee the emissions trading scheme.

China’s five major state-owned power companies last year racked up combined losses of 13.2 billion yuan ($2.1 bln) from generating coal-fired electricity, a sign of the challenges facing the industry in the world’s biggest-polluting nation.

The Australian government bought its lowest volume of offset credits yet at last week’s seventh Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) auction, purchasing just 6.67 million units.

A daily summary of our news plus bite-sized updates from around the world.

California carbon allowances (CCAs) began to recover this week after last week’s Progressive Conservative victory in Ontario sent prices downward, while on the east coast some atypical trading activity took place in the short interim between Wednesday’s RGGI auction and Friday’s result publication.

The prospect of a quick Ontario exit from the tripartite WCI cap-and-trade market could prove a headache for participants and stakeholders on both the primary and secondary markets, according to analysts speaking at a webinar on Thursday.

A £150 million ($199 mln) lawsuit against UK bank RBS brought by creditors over its alleged 2009 role in EU carbon trading tax fraud opened in London on Thursday.