Analysis On Allocation Mechanism Of Global Carbon Abatement Responsibilities And Climate Polices

The issue of climate change has become the most urgent environmental problemthat international society facing. Since scientists proved that the GHG emitted byhuman activities were the main reason of climate change, international society has ledactivities to abate GHG emissions for almost20years. However, the allocationmechanism of global abatement responsibility, which was set up under the regulationsof international climate agreements, like Kyoto Protocol, has many difficulties inpractical implement. And this mechanism often causes debates among countries, andleads the international climate cooperation to the edge of collapse. Under thisbackground, this paper improves on this mechanism and makes analysis on climatepolicies, such as international carbon permits trade, in order to settle controversy andpromote cooperation. The starting point of this paper is bringing up the equityprinciple to deal with climate change issue. And this paper argues that the root ofdebate is different understandings about equity principle among countries. So, I bringup four essential characteristics that the equity principle should satisfy. Firstly, itshould have intercommunity in principle and lead to differentiation in results.Secondly, it should promote cooperation and make consistent opinions widelyachieved. Thirdly, it should not take efficiency as the only and primary objective.Based on this equity principle, this paper ascribes the reason of debate on allocationof abatement responsibilities to two sides as follows. One side is the unreasonableaccounting method of carbon dioxide emissions; the other side is that the mechanismto allocate countries’ responsibilities ignores dynamic factors, in other words, there isno mechanism for developing countries to enter into the list of bearing obligedabatement responsibilities. Based on this analysis, I put forward new mechanism toallocate countries’ responsibilities in the framework of Kyoto Protocol. What’s more,according to the equity principle, I also do analysis on equity issues when developingcountries joining international carbon permits trade, and compare this climate policywith other policies to identify their separate impacts.There are seven chapters in this paper. The first chapter is introduction. In this chapter, I outline background, significance of this topic, and review the relativeliterature. The second chapter is analysis on equity and justice in the field of climatechange problem. It includes three aspects. Firstly, I introduce some commoncognition about equity and justice principles; then, I analyze equity and justice issuesin environmental problems; and finally, I bring forward the equity principle in thefield of climate change problem. Chapter three analyzes the current method andprinciple to count carbon dioxide emissions and allocate the correspondingresponsibilities. There are three sections in this chapter in detail. The first sectionintroduces the status of global abatement responsibilities allocation, pointing out thatalthough the current mechanism leads to differentiation in results, it doesn’t accordwith some essential characteristics of the equity principle. The second section focuseson carbon leakage in the background of Kyoto Protocol, and describes the reasons forthis phenomenon. The last section is empirical test of Kyoto Protocol’s effect onChina’s carbon leakage. The fourth chapter suggests new criterion to allocate eachcountry’s responsibility of carbon dioxide emissions, and makes quantitative analysis.The main idea of this chapter is that the equity principle requires consideration ofconsumers’ responsibilities, and the breakthrough point to deal with debate isintegration of consumers’ responsibilities and producers’ responsibilities. Chapter fiveintroduces an entrance mechanism which uses consumption per capita as abatementthreshold, improving on current emissions abatement mechanism of Kyoto Protocol.Chapter six is analysis on environmental polices to deal with climate change problem.It includes three aspect of content. First is analysis on the economic elements ofcarbon permits trade; the second talks about equity issues of international carbonpermits trade; and the last content is comparative analysis on climate polices,including comparing their environmental effects, costs and efficiencies, and allocationresults. Chapter seven is this paper’s main conclusions and the research directions inthe future.The innovations in this paper may include four points described as follows.Firstly, I ascribe the reasons of debate on allocation of abatement responsibilitiesto two sides. One side is the unreasonableness and inequity of the method to cognizeeach county’s carbon dioxide emissions, the other side is the current mechanism to allocate responsibilities lacks dynamic entrance for developing countries. Theaccounting method of carbon dioxide emissions based on the principles of producers’responsibilities and territorial responsibilities brings a lot of abatement pressure todeveloping countries whose emissions under this accounting method rise rapidly. Asdeveloped countries think if not control the emissions of developing countries, theemissions will rapidly exceed those of developed countries. It seems reasonable to letdeveloping countries bare obliged abatement responsibilities when not consideringhistorical responsibilities. At the same time, this accounting method tends to lead tocarbon leakage as it ignores the transferring factors of emissions. And it is carbonleakage that makes Kyoto Protocol often been criticized on its environmental effect.If scholars don’t detect the unreasonable method, the critical voices will challenge theequity principle of common but differentiated responsibilities (CDR). And it willmisdirect the consensus with a possibility to abandon equity principle of climatechange. In addition, although the regulation to have only developed countries bareobliged responsibilities accords with CDR principle, the lacking of entrancemechanism for developing countries to assume corresponding responsibilitiesmisgives developed countries and makes climate cooperation difficult. According tothose key reasons of debate, this paper improves on current accounting method andintroduces dynamic entrance mechanism for developing countries. Thus, themechanism to allocate global carbon emissions abatement responsibilities isestablished based on the equity principle.Secondly, I make empirical test on Kyoto Protocol’s effect on China’s carbonleakage, which gives support for changing the current accounting method. Whenanalyzing carbon leakage, the relative literature home and abroad usually focuses onpre-estimation using mathematical models. As they seldom pay attention to theaccounting method, their conclusions require abandon unilateral abatement policy,which means developing countries should assume obliged responsibilities. This papermakes analysis from a new view. I compute carbon dioxide emissions embodied inexports using the technology to update IO tables, and empirically test KyotoProtocol’s effect on those emissions.Thirdly, this paper computes main countries’ emissions according to new index which integrates consumers’ responsibilities and producers’ responsibilities. Mostliterature concerned about changing the accounting method are using indexes basedon consumers’ responsibilities, and the corresponding accounts are based on thisprinciple too. Therefore, it lacks integration of both consumers’ responsibilities andproducers’ responsibilities, and has no empirical calculation. In this section, Icompute several main countries’ carbon dioxide emissions, based on index introducedby Rodrigures et al. And this calculation can be the foundation to allocate eachcountry’s static responsibilities.Fourthly, this paper makes analysis on equity issues of international carbonpermits trade, pointing out some precautions that developing countries, like Chinashould bear in mind. Besides, this paper also analyzes the status of EU ETS, andcompares permits trade with carbon tax and hybrid policy.