ETS: The EU stuck the plug in the bathtub. Poland wanted more, but is satisfied

This larger reserve is intended to act as a safety buffer. If there are no allowances on the market, additional allowances can be released. A larger number of allowances available on the market means a reduction in their price, which in turn will result in lower energy costs for industry and households.

Poland initially sought to completely stop the deletion of allowances, which was proposed by the European Commission. As the RMF FM journalist found out, Warsaw ultimately agreed to a compromise, because the most important thing was to stop further allowances from disappearing from the market as quickly as possible. Currently, the mechanism causes the irretrievable removal of approximately 16 million allowances per month, which means a "potential loss" of EUR 1.4 billion.

In an interview with RMF FM, the Polish diplomat vividly compared the agreed solution to "a plug stuck in a bathtub from which water flows." The idea is to stop further loss of allowances before more allowances disappear. As he explained, the threshold of 700 million has largely theoretical significance anyway.

This ceiling is rather theoretical anyway, so it's kind of scary. The most important thing is to stop the deletion. Without the adoption of the regulation, we would lose further allowances from the market every month, explains the Polish diplomat.

Last week, EU leaders called for a quick change to the mechanism at the summit in Brussels. In the part devoted to high energy prices, they called for accelerating work on the reserve to limit fluctuations in CO₂ prices and their impact on electricity prices.

The agreement on the reserve is one of the elements of the revision of the ECJ system. It was also agreed that the gradual lowering of the threshold for deleting allowances would be considered as part of a broader reform of the ETS system.