Emissions deal agreed by UN’s aviation body

MONTREAL - Reuters

The United Nations civil aviation body reached consensus on a roadmap despite the ongoing concerns uncertainity over European Union’s demands. AFP photo

The United Nations civil aviation body reached consensus on a roadmap to create what would be a market-based scheme to help curb carbon emissions from a major industry by 2020, but rejected a European proposal that would have let it apply its own market scheme to foreign airlines in the interim.

The agreement by the executive committee of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) emerged on Oct. 3 after two full days of plenary hall debates and intensive sideline huddles.The resolution sets steps for the ICAO members to take from now to the next triennial assembly in 2016 to curb growing emissions from the aviation sector.

It was unclear earlier whether the committee would be able to reach consensus on the global MBM after a group of mostly developing countries voted to limit the ability of the European Union to apply its emissions trading system to international airlines until a global scheme starts.The EU had insisted that it should be able to apply its ETS, but gradually started backing down amid fierce pushback from countries ranging from Argentina to Russia.