Fresh on the heels of the announcement last week that China was threatening to cancel orders for 9 billion euros worth of orders for Airbus jetliners, seven of Europe’s leading aviation companies have joined forces this week to formally oppose the European Union’s tax on airline emissions designed to combat global warming.

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Time to Reform the EU Emission Trading Scheme by Thomas Spencer and Emmanuel Guérin in European Energy Review. The EU’s pioneering Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) has come to be seen as largely ineffectual as a cap-and-trade approach to curbing carbons. This comprehensive analysis recommends major reforms to save it. Recommended by European Affairs. (1/27)

The neuralgic international dispute on emission fees for airlines has finally jumped to the top of the “transatlantic” in-boxes in Washington and Brussels. The issue has been venomously deadlocked for months, as described in a recent article in European Affairs (which sparked feedback, public and private, from both industry and regulatory circles). But the long-simmering dispute is now approaching a January 1 deadline – trigger date for the EU to start its program on airliners for their carbon emissions over their entire flights anywhere in the world if they use an EU airport.

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             (See comment on this subject by IATA official at end of story.)

It is called “going postal” in American slang when a dispute, usually in the workplace, becomes extremely and uncontrollably angry. That is exactly what has happened in the long-simmering dispute between the EU and the U.S. (and most other global players) about European intentions to levy emission-charges on all flights in or out of EU airports.

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Held in cooperation with the German Embassy and the Representative of German Industry and Trade on March 30, 2011, this event showcased the development of the electric car industry on both sides of the Atlantic, and highlighted the necessary R&D, infrastructure and energy supply challenges. Speakers included Ralph Fücks, President, Heinrich Boll Stiftung, Germany; Edwin Owens, U.S. Department of Energy; Brian Rampp, BMW; Brian Wynne, Electric Drive Transportation Association; Dr. Matthias Haun, Bosch; Lee Godown, GM; Claus Fest, RWE; Michael Kagan, Constellation Energy; and Daniel Ciarcia, General Electric; and Luis Giron, Siemens.