Beijing launches paid bidding for carbon emission quotas

Recently, in accordance with the "Beijing City Carbon Emissions Trading Management Measures", the Beijing City Ecological Environment Bureau organized and carried out the city's 2023 paid bidding and issuance of carbon emission quotas, and entrusted the city's carbon emissions trading institution Beijing Green Exchange to implement the specific implementation. The bidding process was completed in early September. During this period, a total of 68 key carbon emission units submitted bidding declarations, and 63 units successfully bid. The transaction volume was 348304 tons, the unified transaction price was 104.89 yuan/ton, and the total transaction value was 36.5336 million yuan. The bidding proceeds will be turned over to the state treasury according to procedures.

It is understood that in March 2024, Beijing City revised and issued the "Beijing City Carbon Emissions Trading Management Measures" to improve and standardize carbon emissions trading and related activities, which clarified that the municipal ecological environment department can issue carbon emission quotas in both free and paid ways. Carbon emissions trading means that carbon emission rights are listed and traded, and prices are discovered through market mechanisms, reflecting that "carbon emission has costs and carbon reduction has benefits" to stimulate carbon emission units to reduce carbon emissions.

In accordance with the publicly released rules, the Beijing City Department of Ecology and Environment confirms the carbon emissions of key carbon emission units included in management on an annual basis, and issues free carbon emission quotas for each key unit in accordance with the prescribed methods. If key emission units improve their own energy efficiency, technological transformation and other measures to make their annual carbon emissions lower than the free quotas they obtain, they can sell surplus quotas in the carbon market to gain benefits; units with insufficient carbon emissions can also complete the obligation to pay carbon emission quotas through market purchase quotas and other methods.

Since 2022, Beijing City has carried out four paid bidding issuance of quotas based on the operation of the carbon market, providing price reference for key carbon emission units that have surplus quotas to sell and need to purchase quotas to complete performance and settlement, and giving full play to market mechanisms to control greenhouse gas emissions and promote green and low-carbon development.