Germany faces billion-euro-bill for not meeting climate targets in EU effort-sharing

Germany faces fines to the tune of two billion euros by 2020 for failing to meet emissions reduction targets in sectors not covered by the European Emissions Trading System (ETS), Andreas Mihm writes in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. The German government will have to buy up emissions allowances from other states with a better record of meeting the EU targets, especially from Eastern Europe, the article says. So far, Germany was able to compensate for missing certain targets through saving more emissions than formally necessary in other areas, “but since October, every additional tonne of CO₂ will have to be paid for straight from the state’s budget,” a situation that did not exist before, says Hans-Jochen Luhmann of the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy. The exact bill that Germany will have to foot depends on the price for carbon emissions that is derived from the ETS, but the German government so far has not included the expected additional costs in its budget planning, Mihm writes.  
In an answer to a parliamentary inquiry by the pro-business party FDP, the government says it cannot confirm calculations by the Institute for Applied Ecology (Öko-Institut) that the EU’s effort-sharing might cost up to 30 billion euros by 2030. “The EU member states are not obliged to reveal the costs for emissions allowances transfers,” the government says, adding that the exact bill could therefore not be calculated and that it would “not take part in speculation.” 

Find the government’s answer in German here.

See the CLEW article Germany may have to buy way out of EU climate goal – ministry paper and the factsheet Understanding the EU ETS for more information.