Intermediaries

We are pleased to announce that currently, 35 companies have agreed to provide market access for the purchase of national emissions certificates (nEZ) as intermediaries, thereby supporting the supply of nEZ for all obligated companies.

As an alternative to using one or more intermediaries, obligated companies can also apply for direct admission to EEX and ECC. Please understand that we cannot make any statement on the duration of the admission process at this point, as this depends on individual factors of the applying company and applications are processed in the order in which they are received.

For direct admission to EEX/ECC, the legislator imposes high requirements to protect the integrity of the market. This includes, for example, checks on the business model of the participants, traders and responsible persons for the purpose of preventing money laundering and fraud, among other things. These are requirements that are typically met by large trading companies, but also financial institutions, which therefore usually make up the majority of direct participants in a market.

In the overall view of essential criteria (lower one-off and annual administrative costs, fast market access, portfolio effects during post-purchase, additional services on the one hand, and lower fixed and variable fees as well as higher insolvency protection on the other), the use of an intermediary is advantageous for companies that only occasionally participate in the sales process or only have a low to medium demand for nEZ.

Admission

Sales

On 15^th March 2021, European Energy Exchange AG (EEX) was awarded the contract for the sales of fuel emission allowances in the national Emissions Trading Scheme (nEHS) by the German Federal Environment Agency. Fuel emissions trading has been in force in Germany since 1^st January 2021. The instrument will set a CO₂ price for the heat and transport sectors at a national level for the first time, as previously this has not been covered by the European Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS).

All CO₂-emitting fuels placed on the market, in particular petrol, diesel, heating oil, liquefied petroleum gas, natural gas and coal, are included in the nEHS. The obligated parties under the nEHS are those who place fuels on the market, for example natural gas suppliers or companies in the mineral oil industry.

Secondary Market

EEX currently does not offer an on-exchange secondary market for nEHS certificates during the fixed price phase. Through the bilateral, off-exchange secondary market it is in principle possible though to purchase or sell nEZ with the previous year’s vintage.

Some of the companies which act as intermediary and organize market access to purchase nEZ also offer the possibility to trade nEZ with the previous year’s vintage. These companies are labelled in the list of intermediaries which is published on this webpage.

In addition, q-bility, a strategic partner of EEX, offers the possibility to trade nEZ with the previous year’s vintage on their trading platform. Participants can enter “requests for quotations” to purchase or sell nEZ and hence receive quotations for potential prices. If both side agree on a deal on the platform, they would then enter a bilateral contractual agreement afterwards.

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