Benchmarking is more than a tool for distributing CO2 allowances within a trading system. It goes to the fundamental question of what the future of the cement industry ought to be and the appropriate CO2 performance metric for stimulating improvement and innovation.

In Holcim's opinion, that metric must capture the full potential for emission reductions in our sector. Clinker benchmarking runs counter to the long-term view and best interest of the industry and the environment in which it operates.

• Reduction of the clinker content of cement is the single most cost effective option for reducing emissions. To exclude it from the benchmark is to deny its role in the industry’s CO2 performance improvement. 
• Clinker benchmarking distributes more allowances to installations with high CO2 emissions. As a consequence, the effort to comply with a further reduction of the allowances will be much more difficult to achieve for those companies that have already taken action. This can hardly be the intention of the system.
• Beyond Europe and the cement industry, a clinker benchmark will simply not be understood. The industry’s product is cement. Over the last decade, Holcim, far not alone, but also other international cement groups, have effectively positioned the cement industry as a responsible sector tackling its CO2 emission per ton of cementitious materials, addressing all improvement levers at process and product level. 
• To request a cement benchmark in Europe supports the cement industry’s efforts for an international sectoral agreement, which amongst other things could form the basis for engaging the cement industry in emerging and developing countries, leveling the global playing field and avoiding carbon leakage.