The European Parliament today voted against the Commission's back-loading proposal. In response to the Parliament's vote, European Commissioner for Climate Action Connie Hedegaard said: "The Commission of course regrets that the European Parliament has not approved the back-loading proposal. However, it is worth noting that, when it was suggested in a second vote that the Parliament finalise its rejection right away, this was not supported. The proposal will now go back to the Parliament's Environment Committee for further consideration.

Europe needs a robust carbon market to meet our climate targets and spur innovation. The Commission remains convinced that back-loading would help restore confidence in the EU ETS in the short-term until we decide on more long-term structural measures. We will now reflect on the next steps to ensure that Europe has a strong EU ETS.

In doing so, the Council's position on the proposal will be an important factor and I take note of the Irish Presidency's reaction today to urgently pursue and conclude discussions among Member States. The market, the investors and our international partners are all waiting."

The European Commission had proposed to postpone (back-load) the auctioning of 900 million EU ETS allowances from the years 2013-2015 to 2019-2020. This measure was designed to rebalance supply and demand and to reduce price volatility without any significant impacts on competitiveness.

Read more:

• Structural reform of the European carbon market
• Back-loading proposal
• EU Emissions Trading System