The president of the European Commmission has threatened to impose carbon tariffs on imports unless the US agrees to a global climate change deal. Jose Manuel Barroso wants to protect energy-intensive sectors such as aluminium, steel and cement.
He says there is no point these industries cutting emissions in Europe if they lose business to countries with more lax rules on carbon emissions.
The threat of trade measures is the nuclear bomb of climate negotiations - and the commission president said he very much hoped it would not be used.
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US trade representative Susan Schwab has said that climate change should not be used as an excuse for protectionism.
She was speaking in Brussels after French President Nicolas Sarkozy said a European tax could be imposed on states that refused to cap carbon emissions.
Ms Schwab said the United States had been “dismayed” at climate being used as a reason to close markets.
Speaking alongside her, EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson agreed restrictions were not the way forward.
“They’re not cost efficient, they carry a risk of retaliation, they would result in increasing cost for European industry at large,” he said.
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Britain said on Tuesday it did not support proposed punitive trade measures threatened by the European Commission against countries that do not sign up to greenhouse gas emissions cuts.
Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks said proposals on Monday from European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso that importers may have to obtain emissions permits equivalent to those of the European competitors “might look like trade barriers.”
We believe in global trade, we want more of it in the future, not less, and that is good for the European economy,” Wicks told BBC radio. “So we are against any measures which might look like trade barriers.”
