Emissions Trading / Carbon Market News (13/01/2025)

Dear Sir or Madam,

On Wednesday, an expert hearing on the TEHG (Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Act) will take place in the German Bundestag, which will focus on the introduction of the EU Emissions Trading System EU ETS II in 2027 for the building and transport sectors and the associated transition of national emissions trading to European trading.

In this context, at the end of November, the Bundesrat (Federal Council) had submitted a proposal to auction national emission certificates at a fixed price of EUR 65.00 per tonne on the EEX in 2026 as well. The current BEHG (Fuel Emissions Trading Act) stipulates that the fixed-price phase will expire next year and auctions should take place in a price range of EUR 55.00 to EUR 65.00.

Since the obligated companies would have to submit emission reports for EU ETS II by 30 April 2025 in order to implement the EU requirements, this deadline has now been suspended because the TEHG amendment has not yet been adopted. A new deadline is unknown at the moment.

Last year, the German government received a total of €18.5 billion (previous year: €18.4 billion) through CO2 emissions trading. These revenues are channelled entirely into the KTF (Climate and Transformation Fund). Auction revenues in the EU ETS amounted to EUR 5.5 billion (previous year: EUR 7.7 billion), while national emissions trading (nEHS) generated EUR 13 billion (previous year: EUR 10.7 billion).

The decline in the EU ETS is mainly due to the significantly lower average price of EUR 65.00 (2023: EUR 83.66) for emission allowances. The increase in revenue in the nEHS was due, on the one hand, to the rise in prices from EUR 30.00 to EUR 45.00 and, on the other hand, to the reduction in the number of emission rights to 85 million in 2024 (previous year: 92 million EUA).

Last week, prices in the EU ETS were 1.4% lower than in the previous week, due to profit-taking after the rise in the previous weeks and the weakening market environment in the energy sector.

After the auctions on the EEX started again last week, 11,343,500 EUAs will be auctioned this week, which corresponds to an increase of 11.5% compared to the previous week.

Dear readers, up to now, we have indicated the prices for wholesale quantities of voluntary emission rights (VER) in our stock market prices listed below. However, as these have proven to be of little significance in the real trading of CO2 certificates, we will now show you the general market environment. Instead, you will now find the price development of British emission rights (UKA / United Kingdom Allowances) and gas (UK natural gas) alongside the prices for Brent Crude Oil and the exchange rate for the euro to the US dollar, which have been shown for years.



  (Average Quotes Exchange / OTC)
       
Instrument03/01/2510/01/25Change
EUA (December-25-Future)75.94 EUR74.85 EUR-1.09 EUR
nEZ (national Emission Allowances (D))55.00 EUR55.00 EUR+0.00 EUR
UKA (December-25-Future (UK))36.61 GBP34.88 GBP-1.73 GBP
UK Natural Gas (December-25-Future)117.34 GBP112.56 GBP-4.78 GBP
ICE Brent Crude Oil (December-25-Future)72.97 USD74.27 USD+1.33 USD
EURO (Forex)1.0307 USD1.0242 USD-0.0065 USD

(EUA. UKA, Natural Gas, Crude Oil and Euro Currency shows day-end-exchange quotes. This market information has just an informational character and are no advice or offer to trade emission allowances or their futures and options. If you want to unsubscribe, please reply to this mail.)

Please call our international carbon desk if any further questions exist: +49.2831.1348220.

With kind regards,

Your Advantag – Team

Emissions Trading / Carbon Market News (06/01/2025)

Dear Sir or Madam,

The old year seems to have flown by and here we are in 2025.

But what’s new in the field of carbon emissions trading? The price per tonne of CO2 in the national German emissions trading scheme has risen from 45 to 55 euros net, an increase of 22.22% after a 50% increase in the previous year.

In addition, due to the new elections in Germany on 23 February 2025, the start of auctions in national emissions trading has been postponed from mid-January to the second quarter of 2025; it will probably not be possible to participate in an auction here before May. We will keep you informed.

In the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS), however, auctions will resume tomorrow and a total of 10,170,500 EUAs from the contingents of the EU, Poland and Germany will be auctioned on all remaining trading days this week.

But there is also a lot going on in emissions trading outside the EU. Dubai is introducing a digital platform for aviation emission certificates (CORSIA) and since the United Arab Emirates also wants to be climate neutral by 2050, a reporting requirement will come into force in May for companies that emit more than 500,000 tonnes of CO2. This is intended to be a preliminary stage for an emissions trading system that follows the EU’s cap-and-trade mechanism.

In the aforementioned election campaign in Germany, some parties want to blame the miserable economic situation in Germany on climate protection. Professor Ottmar Edenhofer, climate economist and director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), has clearly shown that this is not the case.

In an interview with the Neue Osnabrucker Zeitung, he explained that a quarter of all global emissions are already priced and that 30% of the world’s regions have managed to decouple their economic growth from emissions growth.

In the new year, prices for greenhouse gas emissions in the EU ETS rose significantly again. Based on the weekly closing prices, the benchmark future for December 2025 rose by a further 6% over the four trading days, with EUAs managing to return above the 75-euro mark.

The reasons for this included a rise in the gas price due to the alleged intentional destruction of the Estlink2 power cable and the restart of auctions this week on the EEX.

If you need the year-end-quotes 2024 for your bookkeeping, you can find it on our website.

      (Average Quotes Exchange / OTC)       
Instrument27/12/2403/01/25Change
EUA (December-2025-Future)71.56 EUR75.94 EUR+4.38 EUR
VER (Natural Carbon Offsets)0.44 USD0.40 USD-0.04 USD
VER (CORSIA eligible Carbon Offsets)0.40 USD0.44 USD+0.04 USD
nEZ (German National Carbon Units)45.00 EUR55.00 EUR+10.00 EUR
ICE Brent Crude Oil (Benchmark Future)73.80 USD76.88 USD+3.08 USD
EURO (Currency.. Forex)1.0421 USD1.0307 USD-0.0114 USD

(The VER quotes are average rates (carboncredits.com), which can be used within the framework of CORSIA and voluntary carbon offsetting. EUA. Crude Oil and Euro Currency shows day-end-exchange quotes. This market information has just an informational character and are no advice or offer to trade carbon emission rights or their futures and options. If you want to unsubscribe, please reply to this mail.)

Please call our international carbon desk if any further questions exist: +49.2831.1348220.

With kind regards,

Your Advantag – Team

Emissions Trading / Carbon Market News (15/01/2023)

Dear Madam or Sir,

Following several earthquakes, a volcano has erupted in Iceland for the second time in two weeks, emitting large quantities of dust, ash and lava as well as CO2.

Over the past millions of years, volcanoes have ensured that there is sufficient CO2 in the atmosphere to prevent the heat from the sun’s rays in the atmosphere from being quickly reflected back into space, thus creating temperatures conducive to life.

Deniers of human-made climate change like to point this out while ignoring the fact that humans currently emit 100 times more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere each year than all volcanic eruptions combined. As a result, the balance is significantly disturbed and the so-called greenhouse gas effect leads to an increase in the global average temperature with the known consequences, such as extreme weather events, which occur much more frequently the higher the global temperature rises.

These extreme weather events occur because the atmosphere absorbs more moisture, which leads to exceptional regional precipitation and the jet stream responsible for the respective weather conditions slows down in its movement. This in turn leads to weather patterns remaining stable for longer, resulting in either months of rainy weather, as was the case this winter, or months of drought, as was the case in 2018/2019.

These correlations should be recognized by agriculture, then the further subsidization of fossil fuels, which cause this climate change and thus cause more frequent crop failures, would not be high on the list of priorities.

Last Thursday, the auction calendar for national emissions trading in Germany was published by the Leipzig-based EEX. The first auction will take place much later this year than last year, when the auctions started on 10/01/2023.

As before, the nEHS auctions will take place on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

The following dates are of special interest:

  • 05/03/2024 First auction in national emissions trading 2024 (nEZ23/nEZ24)
  • 19/09/2024 Last auction for 2023 nEZ
  • 05/12/2024 Last auction for 2024 nEZ in 2024

The first auction for EU emission allowances (EUAs) takes place today and it will be interesting to see what demand will look like after EUAs lost almost 14% in the last week alone and even briefly fell below the EUR 65 mark. This price level was last seen 15 months ago. However, if the current price level holds, a technical counter-reaction back above the EUR 70 mark would be likely; if not, then the EUR 60 mark would merely be a psychological resistance level.

    (Average Quotes Exchange / OTC)       
Instrument05/01/2412/01/24Change
EUA (December-2024-Future)76.35 EUR65.81 EUR-10.54 EUR
VER (Natural Carbon Offsets)1.18 USD1.81 USD+0.63 USD
VER (CORSIA eligible Carbon Offsets)0.54 USD0.74 USD+0.20 USD
nEZ (German National Carbon Units)45.00 EUR45.00 EUR+0.00 EUR
ICE Brent Crude Oil (Benchmark Future)78.75 USD78.13 USD-0.62 USD
EURO (Currency, Forex)1.0943 USD1.0949 USD+0.0006 USD

(The VER quotes are average rates (carboncredits.com), which can be used within the framework of CORSIA and voluntary carbon offsetting. EUA, Crude Oil and Euro Currency shows day-end-exchange quotes. This market information has just an informational character and are no advice or offer to trade carbon emission rights or their futures and options. If you want to unsubscribe, please reply to this mail.)

Please call our international carbon desk if any further questions exist: +49.2831.1348220.

With kind regards,

ADVANTAG Services GmbH

Emissions Trading / Carbon Market News (08/01/2024)

Dear Madam or Sir,

In 2023, the German government generated a record amount of more than 18 billion euros from carbon emissions trading, which was five billion or 40% more than in the previous year.

A total of almost 8 billion euros was generated from the auctions in the European Emissions Trading system EU ETS and almost 11 billion euros in the national Emissions Trading System nEHS. This revenue is likely to continue to rise as the prices for national emissions certificates are now 50% more expensive than in 2023.

The fact that emissions trading has a strong steering effect is shown by the decline in the use of lignite in Germany, which in 2023 will have reached the level of 60 years ago, as published by the think tank Agora Energiewende This was mainly due to the expansion of renewable energies, which increased by 12% last year.

Compared to the previous year, carbon emissions therefore fell by 73 million tonnes to 673 million tonnes in 2023, the largest decrease ever. At 138 terawatt hours, wind energy was ahead of lignite for the first time last year, with 132 TWh.

However, there are also areas that clearly missed their targets, such as the transport sector once again. Here, a reduction of only 3 million to 145 million tonnes of CO2 was recorded, i.e. 12 million tonnes too much than planned.  This also applies to the building sector, which also showed a decrease of 3 million tonnes to 109 million tonnes of CO2, which is 8 million tonnes above the target.

Nevertheless, the installation of more than 1,000,000 solar systems last year and an increase of 14 gigawatts of energy generation also set a record. Commercial and private installations each accounted for half of this figure.

As Germany is the largest industrialised nation in the EU, these figures have put the price of CO2 emission allowances in the EU ETS under considerable pressure in the past trading week, which is why prices have fallen below the €80 mark again, down 5%.

However, the further we move towards the end of the submission deadline, a bullish development is likely, which is why it could be wise to use this weak phase to buy parts of your EUA portfolio.

This week, there are still no auctions on the EEX; they will only start again for EUAs in the following week. Prices could also be driven up by the fact that a prolonged cold front has arrived in Europe, which will increase demand for energy accordingly.

    (Average Quotes Exchange / OTC)       
Instrument29/12/2305/01/24Change
EUA (December-2024-Future)80.37 EUR76.35 EUR-4.02 EUR
VER (Natural Carbon Offsets)0.91 USD1.18 USD+0.27 USD
VER (CORSIA eligible Carbon Offsets)0.59 USD0.54 USD-0.05 USD
nEZ (German National Carbon Units)30.00 EUR45.00 EUR+15.00 EUR
ICE Brent Crude Oil (Benchmark Future)76.83 USD78.75 USD+1.92 USD
EURO (Currency, Forex)1.1036 USD1.0943 USD-0.0093 USD

(The VER quotes are average rates (carboncredits.com), which can be used within the framework of CORSIA and voluntary carbon offsetting. EUA, Crude Oil and Euro Currency shows day-end-exchange quotes. This market information has just an informational character and are no advice or offer to trade carbon emission rights or their futures and options. If you want to unsubscribe, please reply to this mail.)

Please call our international carbon desk if any further questions exist: +49.2831.1348220.

With kind regards,

ADVANTAG Services GmbH