Does the opening of the carbon market affect electricity prices?
Our reporter Liu Jin
A few days ago, the national carbon emissions trading market officially launched online trading.
With more than 2,200 power generation companies included in the list of key emission units, my country has become the world's largest carbon market.
While welcoming the "opening" of the carbon market, there are also some concerns in the community.
For example, what is the price of carbon trading?
Will it increase the cost of the power generation industry?
Will it trigger an increase in residential electricity prices?
In this regard, a reporter from the Economic Daily conducted an interview.
Carbon prices will gradually increase
At present, there are two main ways to price carbon in the world, namely, carbon tax and carbon market.
Carbon tax is an administrative order. The government imposes a mandatory carbon price on enterprises, but cannot determine future emissions; carbon trading is a market approach, which stipulates total carbon emissions through policies, and the price of carbon is determined by market transactions themselves.
Countries in the world have different choices according to their own conditions.
According to statistics from the World Bank, as of 2020, there are 61 carbon pricing mechanisms that have been implemented or are under planning globally, including 31 carbon emission trading systems and 30 carbon tax plans.
In both the carbon tax and the carbon market, China chose the carbon market.
Zhao Yingmin, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, previously stated at the State Council’s regular policy briefing that domestic and foreign practices have shown that the carbon market is a policy tool to achieve specific emission reduction targets at a lower cost. Compared with traditional administrative management methods, it can both The responsibility for greenhouse gas emission control is consolidated to the enterprise, and it can provide corresponding economic incentives for carbon emission reduction, reduce the cost of emission reduction in the whole society, and promote green technology innovation and industrial investment, and provide for the relationship between economic development and carbon emission reduction. An effective tool.
After the official online transaction, my country's carbon price exceeded previous expectations.
Zhao Yingmin introduced that before the launch of the national carbon market, the weighted average carbon price in the past two years was about 40 yuan based on the operation of the seven local pilots.
On July 16, the first day of the opening of the national carbon market, the opening price of carbon emission allowances was 48 yuan/ton, and the closing price was 51.23 yuan/ton.
"In the future, with policy tightening and emission reduction efforts, carbon prices will inevitably rise." Chai Qimin, director of the Strategic Planning Department of the National Climate Strategy Center, believes that the current national carbon market has just started and is still in the incubation period. From the perspective of policy makers , I hope that companies can become familiar with the rules as soon as possible and take the initiative to embark on the track of low-carbon development.
Similarly, Lin Boqiang, dean of the China Energy Policy Research Institute of Xiamen University, believes that carbon trading has just begun, and as the volume of trading increases, carbon prices will gradually increase.
But it will be a gentle ascension process, and there will be no particularly drastic changes.
Increasing costs of traditional electricity companies
At present, the first batch of the national carbon market is only included in the power generation industry, which means that the carbon market takes the power industry as a breakthrough, and power generation companies will take the lead in launching carbon trading.
"Carbon trading started in the power generation industry. There are several reasons." Lin Boqiang analyzed, first, power generation companies are one of China's largest carbon emission sectors, consuming nearly half of coal; second, the power generation industry’s carbon emissions statistics The difficulty is low, such as how much coal is consumed in total, and most of them are state-owned enterprises, which is relatively easy to implement. Third, the current electricity prices in China, especially residential electricity prices, are stable, and carbon transaction costs will not be easily transmitted to the downstream of the industrial chain, which means The impact on the economy and society is controllable.
Judging from international experience, because of the large amount of carbon dioxide emissions and the high coal consumption, the power generation industry is the first choice for inclusion in the carbon market of all countries.
The power generation industry is included first, which can simultaneously play a synergistic role in reducing pollution and carbon.
The "China Energy and Power Development Outlook 2020" report released by the State Grid Energy Institute shows that as the level of terminal electrification continues to increase, power demand will maintain a sustained and rapid growth before 2035, and some carbon emissions will gradually shift from the terminal energy sector to electricity In the industry, electric energy will gradually occupy the core position of end-use energy.
At present, my country's carbon market quota adopts the industry benchmark law with intensity control as the basic idea and implements free allocation.
When allocating allowances, it will be based on the actual output of the company to benchmark the advanced carbon emission level of the industry.
However, in principle, the carbon emission allowances allocated to enterprises will decrease year by year to promote enterprises' emission reduction.
Lin Boqiang said that due to rising costs, the coal-fired power generation industry will be affected to a certain extent. Compared with this, the new energy power generation industry, such as renewable energy power generation, nuclear power and other industries have comparative advantages.
From the perspective of the change from subsidy support to relying on market reforms, it also means that my country's clean energy has reached a higher level.
Lin Boqiang analyzed that various impacts will force power companies to weigh the costs of all parties, develop more new formats, transform business models, enhance their financial attributes, and invest in the blue ocean of new energy.
The tiered electricity price system will be improved
"The pressure of rising carbon prices on power generation companies will be transmitted to electricity prices." Lin Boqiang said that electricity is a basic input, and the country will maintain the stability of the fundamentals of the industry, but the power reform will definitely follow.
In fact, there has been a noticeable increase in the recent voices about power reform.
On July 15, the official website of the Anhui Provincial Development and Reform Commission issued the "Notice on Trial Implementation of Seasonal Peak Electricity Prices and Demand Response Electricity Prices (Draft for Solicitation of Comments)" to solicit public opinions.
In its recent reply, the National Development and Reform Commission admitted that my country has been experimenting with lower residential electricity prices for a long time, and residential electricity prices have been significantly lower than power supply costs because industrial and commercial users have undertaken the corresponding cross-subsidies.
Compared with other countries in the world, my country's residential electricity prices are relatively low, and industrial and commercial electricity prices are relatively high.
The National Development and Reform Commission stated that in accordance with the requirements of further deepening the market-oriented reform of electricity prices, the next step is to improve the tiered electricity price system for residents, gradually alleviate electricity price cross subsidies, so that electricity prices can better reflect the cost of power supply, restore the commodity attributes of electricity, and form a more adequate reflection. Resident electricity price mechanism based on electricity cost, supply-demand relationship, and resource scarcity.
"In foreign countries, the price of electricity for residential use is higher than that for industrial electricity." Lin Boqiang said, this is mainly because residential electricity is scattered and time is concentrated in peak hours, and the cost is higher than that of industrial electricity.
However, my country has continued the state where the price of industrial electricity is higher than that of residential electricity.
Lin Boqiang analyzed that at present, it is more likely that the increase in electricity cost will be transmitted to the industry, but it does not mean that residents' electricity consumption will remain motionless, and it may be moderately adjusted.