Commission President Ursula von der Leyen sells her proposal to decouple the EU from Russian natural gas and oil as a gigantic investment program of 300 billion euros by 2030. In fact, the Commission only described the costs of the greater expansion of renewables, the additional efforts to save energy and the expansion of liquid gas terminals and infrastructure.

The proposal contains hardly any "fresh money".

Instead, the states should use the money from the Corona development fund and the EU budget.

However, there is one exception: the Commission wants to raise 20 billion euros by selling additional emission rights and passing them on to the EU countries.

Henrik Kafsack

Business correspondent in Brussels.

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This caused an outcry among climate protection associations and the Greens.

Volt MEP Damian Böselager speaks of a fire accelerator for the climate crisis.

Especially since the money would also be used to promote investments in fossil fuels such as LNG.

"The energy transition must not be financed with the climate crisis," says Green MP Michael Bloss.

The federal government also has concerns, “since this could lead to higher CO2 emissions,” as stated in an internal wire report on the EU summit at the beginning of next week, where the topic is on the agenda.

The wire report is available to the FAZ.

Ireland, Denmark and Finland share the concern.

Both the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers must agree before the Commission can sell the emission rights.

The implementation is lacking

With emissions trading, the EU caps the CO2 emissions of industry and electricity producers to the level that corresponds to their climate targets.

To this end, it auctions off a certain number of certificates every year.

These can be traded.

The companies can therefore decide whether to buy certificates for the price or invest in green technologies.

As rights become scarce year after year, the price increases, creating an ever-increasing incentive to reduce emissions.

So much for the theory: in practice it didn't work well for a long time because too many emission rights had been allocated.

The price bobbed at 5 euros per ton.

This has only changed since the EU skimmed off surplus allowances with the "market stability reserve" introduced in 2019.

2.6 billion rights are in reserve today,

two and a half times the total market.

This year, the price rose to almost 100 euros for the first time.

In the eyes of climate protection associations, the reserve is therefore a guarantor for functioning emissions trading and is untouchable.

However, the Commission is planning to touch the reserve.

The 20 billion euros are to be financed through the sale of certificates from the reserve.

At a price of 80 euros, she needs 250 million for it.

That's not much in relation to the total amount.

"Emitting an additional 250 million tons of CO2 is almost twice as much as all German coal-fired power plants emit in a year," calculates Bloss.