Belgium: Data from the Cement Sustainability Initiative (CSI) suggests that the carbon intensity of European Union (EU) cement increased from 2008 to 2014, according to analysis by the environmental campaign group Sandbag. It adds that the sector made greater strides in reducing emissions in the years prior to the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS). Since 2011, the EU cement sector has increased exports of cement clinker outside the EU, demonstrating that the EU ETS has not made the sector globally uncompetitive.
“EU policymakers have overprotected the cement sector in the EU ETS to such an extent that companies have not taken any action to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. The EU’s approach is killing with kindness; by maintaining the status quo on free allocation of allowances they are making their own climate targets undeliverable,” said Wilf Lytton, analyst at Sandbag.
Sandbag say that this highlights the inability of the EU’s climate policy, as currently designed, to address European cement sector emissions. Meanwhile, low-carbon new entrant cement companies operating outside of the EU ETS have commercialised technologies to dramatically reduce the carbon footprint of cement, yet are struggling to scale-up as they fight through a mass of regulation and product standards that support the high-carbon status quo.
Research by Sandbag revealed in March 2016 that incentives in the design of the EU ETS have driven higher greenhouse gas emissions emissions in the cement sector.
