Annual Auction
Allowance Trading
Once a year, EPA auctions a certain number of SO2 allowances at the end of March. Utilities, environmental groups, allowance brokers, and anyone else interested in purchasing allowances can participate. Allowances sold at the auctions will be sold to the highest bidder until no allowances remain. Successful bidders are notified and are listed on our Web site.
To bid in the EPA auctions if you are not an affected utility:
- Open a general allowance account in EPA's Allowance Tracking System, our database of all allowance holdings and transactions. Use the Allowance Account Information form
- Submit a Bid Form and a certified check or an EPA Letter of Credit Form, or a wire transfer of funds. Current-year forms are available below around the end of January each year.
Please note that if you open a general account in our Allowance Tracking System, we must maintain your account in perpetuity, no matter how few allowances it holds. Therefore, please ensure that your Authorized Account Representative is someone we can keep in touch with, and please notify us of when representatives and contact information change.
For more information on EPA’s SO2 allowance auction, see the Allowance Auction Fact Sheet.
EPA tracks the results of each annual auction:
- 2009 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2008 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2007 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2006 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2005 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2004 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2003 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2002 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2001 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 2000 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 1999 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 1998 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 1997 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 1996 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 1995 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 1994 EPA Allowance Auction Results
- 1993 EPA Allowance Auction Results
A compressed (ZIP) Excel spreadsheet (MS Excel, 2.7 MB) provides auction proceeds at the unit and plant level for each year (1993 thru 2009).