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on Resource Economics |
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Issue of 2021‒08‒23
four papers chosen by |
| By: | Marion Leroutier (PSE - Paris School of Economics - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - ENS Paris - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris sciences et lettres - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, PJSE - Paris Jourdan Sciences Economiques - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS Paris - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris sciences et lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, CIRED - Centre International de Recherche sur l'Environnement et le Développement - Cirad - Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - AgroParisTech - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - Université Paris-Saclay - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | Decreasing greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation is crucial to tackle climate change. Yet, empirically little is known on the effectiveness of economic instruments in the power sector. This paper examines the impact of the UK Carbon Price Support (CPS), a carbon tax implemented in the UK power sector in 2013. Compared to a synthetic control unit built from other European countries, emissions from the UK power sector declined by 26 percent on an average year between 2013 and 2017. Bounds on the effects of potential UK confounding policies and several placebo tests suggest that the carbon tax caused at least 80% of this decrease. Three mechanisms are highlighted: a decrease in emissions at the intensive margin; the closure of some high-emission plants at the extensive margin; and a higher probability of closure than in the synthetic UK for plants at risk of closure due to European air quality regulations. This paper shows that a carbon tax on electricity generation can lead to successful decarbonisation. |
| Keywords: | Synthetic control method,Synthetic control method carbon tax,Electricity generation,Carbon tax |
| Date: | 2021–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:ciredw:halshs-03265636&r= |
| By: | Don Fullerton; Shan He |
| Abstract: | Circular Economy literature recommends longer lasting products, in order to reduce pollution from extraction, production, and disposal. Our economic analysis finds conditions where consumers choose lives that are too short – a “durability gap”. Then policies targeting durability raise welfare. While externalities are corrected by Pigovian taxes that ignore durability, raising the output tax nonetheless induces consumers to pay more for goods that last longer. Second, if the tax is suboptimal, a durability mandate raises welfare. Third, internalities have ambiguous effects. Fourth, a social discount rate less than private discount rate is the strongest case for policy to favor durability. |
| JEL: | H21 H23 Q58 |
| Date: | 2021–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29073&r= |
| By: | Sebastian Rausch (ZEW Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research, Mannheim, Germany, Department of Economics, Heidelberg University, Germany, Centre for Energy Policy and Economics at ETH Zurich, Switzerland, and Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, USA); Hidemichi Yonezawa (Division for Energy and Environmental Economics at the Research Department at Statistics Norway) |
| Abstract: | Technology policy is the most widespread form of climate policy and is often preferred over seemingly efficient carbon pricing. We propose a new explanation for this observation: gains that predominantly accrue to households with large capital assets and that influence majority decisions in favor of technology policy. We study climate policy choices in an overlapping generations model with heterogeneous energy technologies and distortionary income taxation. Compared to carbon pricing, green technology policy leads to a pronounced capital subsidy effect that benefits most of the current generations but burdens future generations. Based on majority voting which disregards future generations, green technology policies are favored over a carbon tax. Smart “polluter-pays” financing of green technology policies enables obtaining the support of current generations while realizing efficiency gains for future generations. |
| Keywords: | Climate Policy; Green Technology Policy; Carbon Pricing; Overlapping Generations; Intergenerational Distribution; Social Welfare; General Equilibrium |
| JEL: | Q54 Q48 Q58 D58 H23 |
| Date: | 2021–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eth:wpswif:21-362&r= |
| By: | Colmer, Jonathan (University of Virginia); Lin, Dajun (American Institutes for Research); Liu, Siying (Amazon); Shimshack, Jay (University of Virginia) |
| Abstract: | Conventional wisdom suggests that marginal damages from particulate matter pollution are high in less-developed countries because they are highly polluted. Using administrative data on the universe of births and deaths, we explore birthweight and mortality effects of gestational particulate matter exposure in high-pollution yet high-income Hong Kong. The marginal effects of particulates on birthweight are large but we fail to detect an effect on neonatal mortality. We interpret our stark mortality results in a comparative analysis of pollution-mortality relationships across studies. We provide early evidence that marginal mortality damages from pollution are high in less-developed countries because they are less developed, not because they are more polluted. |
| Keywords: | particulate matter, early childhood, comparative analysis |
| JEL: | Q53 I15 Q56 |
| Date: | 2021–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14591&r= |