Rewards the carbon efficient and does not
encourage dirty plants

Rather than encouraging the switch to renewable energy, the EU ETS has effectively subsidised the construction of fossil fuel-fired power stations. It has also encouraged the owners of dirty plants of all types to keep them open during its first phase so that they can qualify for the distribution of free emissions permits in Phase Two.

Cap and Share on the other hand would signal to the owners of dirty plants that they should replace them with clean ones immediately, as the extra cost of buying the fuel to run inefficient ones will rise and rise.

At a domestic level, as the rising price of energy (in primary energy, in the goods we buy and in any environmental costs that may be factored in) a Cap and Share approach will reward those who invest in lowering the energy used in their lives.