Europe’s most effective tool for cutting greenhouse gases - the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) - is at risk of being watered down, critics warn, after the European Commission proposed an overhaul that gives polluters a cheaper, slower path to reducing emissions. The review, arriving on the heels of deadly wildfires in Spain and record-breaking heatwaves across the continent (which scientists say would be “virtually impossible” without climate breakdown), aims to align the ETS with Europe’s 2040 target of a 90% emissions reduction. But pressure from 10 EU member states, who claim the system hikes energy costs and hurts competitiveness, has led to concessions: heavy industries get free pollution permits for longer, and the cap on permits will shrink more slowly. Since 2005, the ETS has cut emissions by 47% compared to 2005 levels, but the proposed slowdown could allow an extra 2 billion tonnes of CO2, according to WWF. The scheme would extend to municipal waste and private jets (finally ending that unfair privilege for the rich), but flights to China and the US are spared to avoid conflict with the Trump administration. EU climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra called the ETS a “phenomenal asset” that saved Europe from consuming 100 billion cubic metres more gas, but admitted it has weaknesses - namely, unfair competition from non-European rivals. Critics like German Green MEP Michael Bloss accuse the commission of handing industry “a licence to pollute for even longer and at a lower cost,” while WWF’s Camille Maury warned that removing building blocks from the ETS is like destabilising a Jenga tower. The draft law must now be agreed by the EU’s 27 member states and the European Parliament.