19 June 2026 – Forty industrial corporations write a letter, and the issue immediately appears across the media. For small and medium-sized businesses in German and Europe, the house has been on fire for much longer – only until now, hardly anyone seemed to care.
EU ETS: Big corporations benefit, SMEs are left out
Around 40 major German corporations – including ArcelorMittal, ThyssenKrupp, and BASF – have addressed a letter to the EU leadership, calling for a fundamental rethink of climate policy.
Their core criticism: rising CO2 costs under the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS), currently around EUR 80 per tonne and trending higher, are undermining European competitiveness, while companies outside Europe face little or none of this burden. Europe is effectively going it alone on climate policy – and shooting itself in the foot in the process.
Aiwanger: Clear Words, Clear Demand
Bavaria’s Minister of Economic Affairs, Hubert Aiwanger of the Free Voters, used blunt language in an interview with Welt on 18 June 2026. He said it was “deeply embarrassing” that Europe’s business leaders had to write a begging letter in the first place. Von der Leyen, he argued, must suspend the EU ETS immediately – ideally abolish it altogether.
He described Chancellor Merz as a “prisoner of the system,” whose room for manoeuvre is being limited by the SPD. His verdict on the Lisbon Strategy of 2000 – under which Europe was supposed to become the most competitive region in the world by 2010 – was devastating: “The exact opposite is happening.”
The EU Commission intends to present proposals next month for reorganizing emissions trading.
What Is Missing from This Debate
Aiwanger is right on substance. But no one in this debate is asking the real question: why only now?
The crushing cost burden created by the EU ETS, CBAM, and high energy prices has not been hitting the German and European Mittelstand only since yesterday – it has been doing so for years.
Small and medium-sized enterprises without lobbying machines, without press departments, and without direct access to Brussels or Berlin have been paying this bill quietly. No media campaign, no open letter, no economics minister pounding the table on their behalf.
Hidden subsidies: 464 billion Euro in free CO2 certificates since 2005
Meanwhile, the companies affected by the EU ETS – including precisely those major corporations now complaining so loudly – have cumulatively received almost EUR 464 billion in free ETS certificates and surplus certificates since 2005. These are hidden subsidies that SMEs have never received and never will receive – but are forced to help pay for.
When 40 corporations write a letter, the media and politicians react immediately. When the Mittelstand collapses under the same costs, it is a footnote – if it is noticed at all.
That is the real scandal in this debate: not EU ETS and CBAM alone, but an economic policy that rewards size, subsidizes dependency, and knowingly and systematically ignores the backbone of the European economy – small and medium-sized enterprises – while ultimately making those SMEs pay for the subsidies handed to the big corporations.
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