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on Resource Economics |
| By: | Sanjit Dhami; Paolo Zeppini (GREDEG - Groupe de Recherche en Droit, Economie et Gestion - UNS - Université Nice Sophia Antipolis (1965 - 2019) - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - UniCA - Université Côte d'Azur) |
| Abstract: | We consider firms' choices between a clean technology that benefits, and a dirty technology that harms, the environment. Green firms are more suited to the clean technology and brown firms are more suited to the dirty technology. We use a model derived from complexity theory that takes account of true uncertainty and increasing returns to technology adoption. We examine theoretically, the properties of the long-run equilibrium, and provide simulated time paths of technology adoption, using plausible dynamics. The long-run outcome is an 'emergent property' of the system, and is unpredictable despite there being no external technological or preference shocks. We describe the role of taxes and subsidies in facilitating adoption of the clean technology; the conflict between optimal Pigouvian taxes and adoption of clean technologies; the optimal temporal profile of subsidies; and the desirability of an international fund to provide technology assistance to poorer countries. |
| Keywords: | Technology choice, Climate change, Complexity, Lock-in effects, Increasing returns, Green subsidies, Public policy, Pigouvian taxes, Stochastic dynamics |
| Date: | 2025–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04998831 |
| By: | Luca Bettarelli; Davide Furceri; Prakash Loungani; Jonathan D. Ostry; Loredana Pisano |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we first test the validity of the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis, using a large sample of approximately 190 advanced and developing countries, over a period of 34 years (1989-2022). We find that (CO 2 ) emissions respond positively to increasing income per capita, up to a turning point of approximately US$25, 000. In a departure from the previous literature, we allow the relationship between economic development and emissions to depend on the stringency of environmental regulation. |
| Keywords: | Kuznets, Climate change, Environmental policy, Carbon tax |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2025-18 |
| By: | Markus Dertwinkel-Kalt; Max R. P. Grossmann |
| Abstract: | When environmental regulations are unpopular, policymakers often attribute resistance to information frictions and poor communication. We test this idea in the context of a major climate policy: Germany’s Heating Law of 2023, which mandates the phase-out of fossil fuel heating. Through a survey experiment with property owners, we examine whether providing comprehensive information about the regulation’s costs, requirements, and timeline affects adoption decisions and policy support. Despite successfully increasing factual knowledge, information provision has no significant effect on intended technology adoption, policy support, or incentivized measures of climate preferences. Instead, pre-existing environmental preferences and demographic characteristics emerge as the key predictors of responses to the regulation. A feeling that existing systems still work well and cost considerations dominate fossil fuel users’ stated reasons for non-adoption, while independence from fossil fuels and perceived contributions to the common good drive adoption among switchers. Our findings suggest that opposition to climate policy stems from fundamental preference heterogeneity rather than information frictions. This has important implications for optimal policy design, highlighting potential limits of information provision in overcoming resistance to environmental regulation. The results also speak to broader questions in political economy about the relationship between knowledge, preferences, and support for policy reform. |
| Keywords: | environmental regulation, technology adoption, information provision, political economy, climate policy |
| JEL: | D83 H31 Q48 Q58 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_11759 |
| By: | Ollila, Saana (Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI)); Bratt Börjesson, Maria (Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI)); Proost, Stef (KU Leuven) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines carbon pricing in the international shipping sector, considering that the benefits from shipping trade and the willingness to pay (WTP) for reducing carbon emissions vary among countries. Given each country’s WTP for reducing carbon emissions, we derive optimal carbon pricing for three different cooperation scenarios and numerically illustrate their welfare effects for shipping trade between five major trading blocs (treated as countries). Full global cooperation provides a benchmark for the analysis. The focus of this study is on self-enforcing bilateral agreements, where we analyze two types of agreement: one with an equal allocation of tax revenues and one with a flexible allocation of tax revenues. We show what drives cooperation and how shipping trade volumes and shipping technologies respond to the agreements. Self-enforcing bilateral agreements between the five trading blocs could reduce emissions by three to seventeen percent compared to a baseline scenario with no emission reduction policies in place. The reduction in emissions is the result of a reduction of the volume of trade and implementation of abatement technologies. The high carbon abatement costs in shipping remain the main limitation for larger emission reductions. |
| Keywords: | Climate; shipping; international agreements; carbon taxes; Emissions Trading System; IMO |
| JEL: | F18 H23 Q56 Q58 |
| Date: | 2025–04–23 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:vtiwps:2025_002 |