Over the past decade, carbon trading has emerged as the industrialized world's primary policy response to global climate change despite considerable controversy. With carbon markets worth $144 ...billion in 2009, carbon trading represents the largest manifestation of the trend toward market-based environmental governance. In Carbon Coalitions, Jonas Meckling presents the first comprehensive study on the rise of carbon trading and the role business played in making this policy instrument a central pillar of global climate governance.Meckling explains how a transnational coalition of firms and a few market-oriented environmental groups actively promoted international emissions trading as a compromise policy solution in a situation of political stalemate. The coalition sidelined not only environmental groups that favored taxation and command-and-control regulation but also business interests that rejected any emissions controls. Considering the sources of business influence, Meckling emphasizes the importance of political opportunities (policy crises and norms), coalition resources (funding and legitimacy,) and political strategy (mobilizing state allies and multilevel advocacy).Meckling presents three case studies that represent milestones in the rise of carbon trading: the internationalization of emissions trading in the Kyoto Protocol (1989--2000); the creation of the EU Emissions Trading System (1998--2008); and the reemergence of emissions trading on the U.S. policy agenda (2001--2009). These cases and the theoretical framework that Meckling develops for understanding the influence of transnational business coalitions offer critical insights into the role of business in the emergence of market-based global environmental governance.
This report 'Turning the right corner - ensuring development through a low carbon transport sector' emphasizes that developing countries need to transition to a low carbon transport sector now to ...avoid locking themselves into an unsustainable and costly future. Furthermore, it argues that this transition can be affordable if countries combine policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with broader sector reforms aimed at reducing local air pollution, road safety risks, and congestion. This report looks at relationships between mobility, low carbon transport and development, drawing attention to the inertia in transport infrastructure. It complements the analysis by reviewing how climate change is likely to affect operations and infrastructure, cost-effective measures for minimizing negative effects, and policies and decision frameworks. It further highlights current and projected research findings and examples from developing countries. And it concludes that new technology is not enough, and that urgent action is needed before economies become locked into high-carbon growth. It discusses how to reconcile development with the need to curb emissions, looking at three sets of instruments and their limitations: new technologies and alternative fuels, supply-side measures, and demand-side policies. This report also looks at both available funding, such as carbon financing and international assistance, and at ways to generate new resources, considering that accounting for negative externalities dramatically alters the economics of transport investment.
Glasgow pact leaves 1.5°C goal on life support O'Grady, Cathleen
Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science),
2021-Nov-19, 2021-11-19, 20211119, Letnik:
374, Številka:
6570
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Goal of preventing dangerous warming slipping away, but nations boost emissions cuts
Goal of preventing dangerous warming slipping away, but nations boost emissions cuts
Despite the emergence of regional climate policies, growth in global COâ emissions has remained strong. From 1990 to 2008 COâ emissions in developed countries (defined as countries with ...emission-reduction commitments in the Kyoto Protocol, Annex B) have stabilized, but emissions in developing countries (non-Annex B) have doubled. Some studies suggest that the stabilization of emissions in developed countries was partially because of growing imports from developing countries. To quantify the growth in emission transfers via international trade, we developed a trade-linked global database for COâ emissions covering 113 countries and 57 economic sectors from 1990 to 2008. We find that the emissions from the production of traded goods and services have increased from 4.3 Gt COâ in 1990 (20% of global emissions) to 7.8 Gt COâ in 2008 (26%). Most developed countries have increased their consumption-based emissions faster than their territorial emissions, and non-energy-intensive manufacturing had a key role in the emission transfers. The net emission transfers via international trade from developing to developed countries increased from 0.4 Gt COâ in 1990 to 1.6 Gt COâ in 2008, which exceeds the Kyoto Protocol emission reductions. Our results indicate that international trade is a significant factor in explaining the change in emissions in many countries, from both a production and consumption perspective. We suggest that countries monitor emission transfers via international trade, in addition to territorial emissions, to ensure progress toward stabilization of global greenhouse gas emissions.
Carbon emissions reached an all-time high in 2018, when global carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels increased by about 2.7%, after a 1.6% increase in 2017. Thus, we need to pay special ...attention to carbon emissions and work out possible solutions if we still want to meet the targets of the Paris climate agreement. This Special Issue collects 16 carbon emissions-related papers (including 5 that are carbon tax-related) and 4 energy-related papers using various methods or models, such as the input–output model, decoupling analysis, life cycle impact analysis (LCIA), relational analysis model, generalized Divisia index model (GDIM), forecasting model, three-indicator allocation model, mathematical programming, real options model, multiple linear regression, etc. The research studies come from China, Taiwan, Brazil, Thailand, and United States. These researches involved various industries such as agricultural industry, transportation industry, power industry, tire industry, textile industry, wave energy industry, natural gas industry, and petroleum industry. Although this Special Issue does not fully solve our concerns, it still provides abundant material for implementing energy conservation and carbon emissions reduction. However, there are still many issues regarding the problems caused by global warming that require research.
These days, climate change issues and their impacts on the economy, social and natural system of countries have become the main concern of worldwide, even for those countries that are facing major ...economic problems. These issues arise from the combustion of fossil fuels. One of the major contributors to global CO2 emission is the transport sector. Therefore, in order to identify the trends and characteristics of transport carbon emissions this study reviews the relevant literature significantly; and decomposes carbon emission in this sector in 7 top transport CO2 emitter countries by applying the logarithmic mean Divisia index (LMDI). The results indicated that, during 2000–15, transport carbon emissions increased in the United States, China, India, Canada, Russia, and Brazil whereas decreased in Japan. Hence, in the majority of these countries, energy conservation strategies were not successfully implemented during the study period. In the majority of countries, the main contributor to CO2 emission reductions was carbon intensity, whereas the main drivers of CO2 emission increases were electricity structure and economic output effects. Reductions in carbon emissions could be achieved by further optimizing energy structures, limiting the private vehicle population. A set of policies and regulations, from demand-side and supply-side, must be implemented to be effective in reducing GHGs emissions.
•The study analyzes the patterns of CO2 emissions in 7 top transport carbon emitters.•It uses two methodologies, a review of literature and carbon emission decomposition.•Implementing a set of climate change policies can reduce carbon emission.•The United States and China were the main contributors of transport CO2 emissions.•The main contributor to CO2 emission reductions was carbon intensity.
The reality of climate change associated
with anthropogenic emissions is now widely acknowledged by
the scientific community. Its potential devastating future
harms are equally well perceived and as ...stated in the
Copenhagen Accord major nations agree on the need to jointly
and urgently combat climate change. The international
community is also quite aware that stabilizing atmospheric
concentrations of green-house gases (GHG) at supportable
levels will require a drastic reduction in GHG emissions
within a limited period of time. Undertaking such an
enormous effort triggers several interlinked challenges: (1)
technically mitigating GHG emissions to the required level;
(2) implementing these solutions in countries where the
required amount of emission reduction is most realistically
and efficiently achievable in particular through involving
and using in full the large potential of developing
countries; and (3) mobilizing the large amount of financing
needed to ensure that the corresponding projects and
programs can be effectively implemented. Furthermore, these
challenges must be simultaneously addressed in a way that is
acceptable to all the parties involved. This means in
particulars that any arrangement designed to meet the global
GHG emission reduction challenge must be consistent with the
principle of the common but differentiated responsibilities
of developed and developing countries.
Implementation of regulatory standards has reduced exhaust emissions of particulate matter from road traffic substantially in the developed world. However, nonexhaust particle emissions arising from ...the wear of brakes, tires, and the road surface, together with the resuspension of road dust, are unregulated and exceed exhaust emissions in many jurisdictions. While knowledge of the sources of nonexhaust particles is fairly good, source-specific measurements of airborne concentrations are few, and studies of the toxicology and epidemiology do not give a clear picture of the health risk posed. This paper reviews the current state of knowledge, with a strong focus on health-related research, highlighting areas where further research is an essential prerequisite for developing focused policy responses to nonexhaust particles.
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