Czech PM Fiala says ETS 2 must be postponed

Prime Minister Petr Fiala (ODS) believes it is necessary to postpone the introduction of the European greenhouse gas emissions trading system, which is due to cover fuels used in transport and for heating buildings. He said this today in the Chamber of Deputies in response to an interpellation by ANO MP Martin Kolovratník.

„We will seek to have this system postponed, and I would be pleased if the opposition also supported these proposals,“ the prime minister said.

He also said that Czechia wants the system, known as EU ETS 2, to be reviewed. Finance Minister Zbyněk Stanjura (ODS) also said in July that Czechia would try to push for the cancellation, or at least a substantial postponement, of the start of the ETS 2 emissions allowance system in the European Union.

Fiala also said he wants some of the commitments already adopted to tackle climate change to be reviewed, the ban on combustion engines to be amended, and some agricultural regulations to be revised. In some cases, changes have already been made, he said. Fiala also said that Czechia will receive more than 1.2 trillion crowns by 2030 for energy-saving measures and investment. District heating plants will receive some allowances for free and will not have to raise prices, he added.

MP Kolovratník pointed out that the Chamber of Deputies is currently debating an amendment to the emissions allowance law that transposes part of the relevant European directive. He recalled the argument made by other opposition MPs that the government had left out of the amendment the section introducing the ETS 2 system. He said that ODS MP Václav Král had put forward a proposal that, in his view, would add these measures to the law. The prime minister replied, however, that ODS does not support these proposals and that, according to his information, MP Král had not personally voted for them in the Environment Committee either.