Industrial installations included in the EU’s Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) will see their greenhouse gas emissions provisionally capped at just below 1.927Bnt in 2013, when a new seven-year trading period starts.

According to the European Commission: “For 2013, the absolute Community-wide quantity of allowances referred to in Article 9 of the Directive 2003/87/EC amounts to 1,926,876,368.”

The average annual total quantity of allowances issued by Member States in accordance with the Commission Decisions on their 2008-12 national allocation plans amounted to 2,032,998,912 allowances. The latest decision will see the total annual quantity of allowances to be issued from 2013 onwards decrease by a linear factor of 1.74% or 35,374,181 allowances.

The cap excludes new sectors, such as the aluminium industry, and new gases such as nitrous oxide, which will be added in 2013. A revised cap based on the emissions data of new entrants will be published in September with a final cap not expected before 2013.