Carbon Tariff Law Questions Under The Wto System

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions and slowing down global warming are theimportant tasks that every country is faced with. Developed countries think thatimported products from non-reduction countries raise the issue of “loss ofcompetiveness” and “carbon leakage”, therefore they propose to levy “carbontariff”.The American Clean Energy and Security Act was approved by the House ofRepresentatives on June,2009, which stipulates carbon tariff clause---InternationalReserve Allowance Program. Accoring to the Act, the US is entitled to impose carbontariff on energy-intensive products from countries that haven’t take effective measuresto reduce greenhouse gas emissions and protect its domestice manufacturing industry.This essay analyze the legitimacy of carbon tariff under WTO combined withGATT/WTO cases and it can be divided into five parts: Part1introduces the UnitedNations Framework of Climate Change, Kyotol Protocol and European UnionDirective2003/87/EC. Part2concludes carbon tariff in essence is form of Border TaxAdjustment (BTA) and shall comply with WTO rules. Part3illustrates that carbontariff is agaist WTO basic rules(National Traeatmeng and Most-FavoredTreatment).Part4explains that the US can’t cite Article XX of GATT1994to defensefor itself. Part5analyze European Union’s carbon emission tax on airlines.Part6gives some suggestions to deal with carbon tarriff.