25It follows from the very letter of Directive 2003/87 that the obligation to surrender allowances equal to the emissions for the preceding year by 30 April of the current year in order to have them cancelled applies with particular force. Referred to obligatorily in the greenhouse gas emissions permit under Article 6(2)(e) and formulated unequivocally in Article 12(3), that obligation is the only one for which Directive 2003/87 itself provides for a specific sanction, whereas the sanction for any other conduct contrary to its provisions is, under Article 16, left to the discretion of the Member States. The key role of the allowance surrender process in the scheme of the directive is also apparent from the fact that being ordered to pay the penalty does not release the operator from the obligation to surrender the corresponding allowances during the surrender process the following year. The only flexibility allowed under Directive 2003/87 with respect to the penalty concerns its level, which is lowered from EUR 100 to EUR 40 for the ‘learning’ period for the scheme, that is to say, 2005 - 2007.
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