BRUSSELS — Three letters are about to dominate policy debates in the European Union. Best get familiar with them.
This Friday, the European Commission will sketch out the future of the Emissions Trading System, or ETS, its most powerful tool to reduce the bloc’s contribution to global warming.
The reform proposal will kick off months of squabbling among leaders and lawmakers, accompanied by ferocious lobbying from industry and campaigners, as they dissect and amend the plans.
The outcome will determine the path forward for Europe’s heavy industry, shaping decades of investments, and for the bloc’s efforts to cut planet-warming pollution. That’s because the ETS regulates the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU, mostly factories and power plants, by turning carbon dioxide into an expense companies want to avoid.
