On 23 September 2025, the Sino-German Cooperation: Emissions Trading Scheme, Carbon Market Mechanisms and Mitigation of Non-CO₂ Greenhouse Gas Emissions project held the “Sino-German Workshop on Enhancing Carbon Market Data Quality of Iron and Steel Industry” in Shanghai, co-hosted by GIZ and the National Center for Climate Change Strategy and International Cooperation (NCSC). Leaders and experts from Chinese and German ministries, relevant authorities, industry associations and research institutions attended the workshop and engaged in in-depth discussions.
Mr. Wang Tie, Director of the ETS Division of the Department of Climate Change at Ministry of Ecology and Environment, delivered the opening remarks, highlighting that China’s national carbon market has entered a rapid development phase. This year, the steel sector has been included in China’s carbon market, a significant development as the low–carbon transition of the steel sector is crucial for achieving China’s carbon peaking and neutrality goals. He noted that Germany’s mature technology and management practices provided valuable reference for China in this regard, particularly in areas such as MRV regulation, quality management and data calibration. Mr. Wang Tie emphasised that the workshop could lay a solid foundation for future Sino-German cooperation in this sector.
Building on these remarks, Mr. Marius Kaiser, Policy Officer for Climate Change Act at the Emission Trading Division of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, shared Germany’s recent efforts in improving its carbon trading system and expressed the expectation that the workshop would strengthen technical exchanges and support both countries in addressing future challenges.
Following the opening remarks, several keynote speeches were delivered, starting with Dr. Zhang Xin, Chief Scientist from NSCS, who presented on the progress on the inclusion of the iron and steel industry in China’s national carbon market. Explaining the importance, principles and stages of sectoral coverage of steel expansion, he focused on the steel sector’s current status, organization framework, data management system including MRV, and the “three-level” joint data quality review at national, provincial and municipal levels.
Continuing from this, Mr. Zhou Caihua from the China Environmental United Certification Center introduced the accounting and reporting guidelines for the iron and steel industry while Mr. Tang Chunchao from the China Quality Certification Center presented the verification technical guidelines for thesector. Through their accounts they covered the objectives, significance and key features of these two guidelines, as well as the accounting methods, monitoring parameters and key verification points.
Offering perspectives from Germany Ms. Rebeca Sahagun-Martinez from the German Emission Trading Authority (DEHSt) shared MRV experience from the viewpoint of the German competent authority, reviewing the MRV compliance cycle, including report submission, allowance surrender, report improvement and compilation. She also introduced DEHSt’s compliance tools, on-site inspection procedures, information requests, and the specific characteristics of the iron and steel industry in MRV under the ETS framework.
To complete the exchange, Dr. Wolfgang Eichhammer presented the MRV method for long-process iron and steel in the EU ETS, comparing the standard approach and mass balance approach. He explained that the EU ETS adopts the mass balance approach and provided an overview of integrated iron and steel production, monitoring regulation, monitoring boundaries, and free allocation rules.
The workshop concluded with active exchanges between the participants on key technologies and methodologies to ensure accurate data disaggregation, and effective measures to improve carbon emission measurement accuracy.
