Impacts Of The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) On Regional Economy And Environment In China

Global warming has become the focus of global concern.All countries are making efforts to strengthen international climate negotiations and cooperation to deal with this worldwide problem.In December 2015,the Paris Agreement was adopted at the 21st Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.It is the third landmark international legal text on climate change in human history,following the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in1992 and the Kyoto Protocol in 1997.Shaping the post-2020 global climate governance landscape.However,there are still many uncertainties in the development of the Paris Agreement.In June 2017,the United States announced that it would stop implementing the Paris Agreement,but it re-joined the Paris Agreement in January 2021.At the same time,the different of the convention and the Kyoto protocol,which requires o nly the developed countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to developing countries do not have mandatory emissions requirements,the first to the Paris agreement among the developing countries into the global mandatory emission reduction,this undoubtedly for developing countries to achieve economic development and bring new pressures and challenges to complete the target.In the face of uncertainties in international climate cooperation and increasing emission reduction obligations for developing countries,should the Chinese government implement the Paris Agreement and continue to actively participate in global environmental governance?Does joining international environmental cooperation really bring benefits to China’s green development?As an early exploration of the latest international climate cooperation"Paris Agreement",the Kyoto Protocol has been participated by many countries since it came into force in 2005 and has been developed for more than ten years.It can be used to evaluate whether China’s participation in international environmental cooperation brings benefits to China.In this paper,the clean Development Mechanism（CDM）,the only north-south environmental cooperation mechanism under the Kyoto Protocol,is taken as the research object,and the information of 3717 county-level cities（districts）where CDM projects are located in China from 2005to 2012 is collected manually.After the introduction and theoretical mechanism analysis of CDM mechanism,the impact of the clean development Mechanism（CDM）on regional economy and environment in China is empirically tested by using differential difference method.The empirical results show that:（1）the implementation of CDM projects in China at the county level cities（districts）of GDP has a significant and positive promotion effect,and effectively reduces the pollution of local gas sulphur dioxide（SO ₂）emissions,use at the county level finance income data and nitrogen dioxide（NO₂）emissions data regression results in robust;（2）CDM projects can bring both economic and environmental benefits to central China;（3）CDM projects of new and renewable energy types can significantly achieve economic growth and environmental improvement,bringing double dividends;（4）through mechanism analysis and test,foreign direct investment,energy structure adjustment and technological innovation are three important influencing mechanisms of CDM on China’s regional economy and environment.These conclusions indicate that clean development mechanism（CDM）can not only guarantee regional economic development,but also follow the path of green development and bring environmental benefits to the project implementation area.Therefore,it also validates China’s correct decision to actively participate in international climate cooperation.As most CDM projects are new energy and renewable energy projects,this result also brings new opportunities for China to take the road of green development.The Chinese government can develop green energy projects according to local conditions,so as to promote sustainable development.In view of the main conclusions and the development dilemma of CDM,policy suggestions are put forward from the aspects of developing clean energy projects,improving the level of clean technology and strengthening regional environmental cooperation.