Despite the Ministry of Ecology and Environment’s (MEE) statement at a press conference in May, the government body has declared that the launch of the online trading function for its national ETS will be postponed to a later date, likely July. No reasons for the delay were given.
The national ETS, which is set to account for four billion tons of carbon emissions, is currently in its final preparation phase. According to public sources, the power generation sector in most of the provinces has already completed the verification process. The authorities are planning to finish verification by 30 June 2021, allocate allowances by 30 September 2021, and complete compliance by 31 December 2021. Moreover, key industries such as electric power and steel were encouraged to monitor their GHG emissions, accelerate the comparison of technical standards and monitoring results, and explore the integration of their emission results in their accounting practices.
Furthermore, the ministry has communicated that, in order to achieve its carbon goals, it has co-developed a carbon monitoring and evaluation system together with institutions such as the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Additionally, three pilot projects which address issues such as the real-time monitoring of emission sources are currently in the works.
