Focus on Arts and Ecology

Zhuang Guotai, deputy environment minister, has called upon provincial environmental authorities to "grasp the relay baton" from Beijing and speed up their data collection work in preparation for the launch of China’s national emissions trading scheme (ETS), reports Caixin. China announced plans for a national ETS in December 2017 to help monitor and reduce CO2 emissions, but Beijing is waiting for some provinces to submit historical CO2 emissions data of polluting enterprises. The ETS scheme will start with the power generation sector, but Zhuang says that the iron and steel sector, nonferrous metals, construction materials and petrochemicals sectors are on the waiting list to join the ETS. Each participant in the ETS is assigned a CO2 allowance informed by historical emissions data. They must pay extra to emit more than their allowance.