Following the successful two-day internal kick-off meeting held in Berlin in November, CECILIA2050's approach was first presented to an interested audience at the UN climate conference in Doha on 3 December 2012. The three-year project involves drafting recommendations for a suitable mix of instruments to help the EU achieve the 2050 emission reduction targets set by Heads of State and Government in 2009. Ecologic Institute's Head of Climate Matthias Duwe laid out how CECILIA2050 results will serve to inform a review of EU climate policy, including its flagship instrument, the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) over the course of the next three years. The presentations are available for download.

The subsequent discussion, taking place in a formal side event to the negotiations, and co-organised with Climate Strategies (CS), focussed on both the ongoing debate on means to stabilise the ETS, currently experiencing a lower than anticipated carbon price, as well as options for long-term structural reform.

A panel of experts provided insights from other relevant research and policy thinking, moderated by Climate Strategies’s Managing Director Andrzej Blachowicz.  

Michael Grubb, a founder of Climate Strategies and Editor-in-chief of the Climate Policy journal presented key findings of a 2012 CS report on strengthening the EU ETS.

Tomas Wyns, Director of the Brussels office of Center for Clean Air Policy (CCAP) elaborated on ways in which an ETS reform could be linked to a new industrial policy in Europe, to support industrial sectors’ efforts to decarbonise.

Tom van Ierland, of Unit A.4 at the European Commission’s DG Climate Action responded by presenting the current state of the EC’s analysis, recently released in a Report on the state of the carbon market in 2012.

A wide range of members from audience followed up with questions and comments, focusing on the international dimension of EU climate policy as well as the role of industry.

The CECILIA2050 project will offer a range of public events and expert workshops for future engagement of interested stakeholders to provide feedback and input to its research, details of which will be available at the project website.