Carbon tariffs: an instrument for tackling climate change?: AXA

Carbon Tariffs: Another Name for Green Protectionism?

A Carbon Tariff model that might be acceptable to developing countries

Carbon tariffs are a tax on carbon-intensive imports, which recently triggered heated international debates. Certain industrialized countries have been advocating the adoption of carbon tariffs on products imported from developing countries, such as China. 

According to Marco Springmann, a physicist turned economist, the main reason is that certain rich nations have implemented binding targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while poorer countries have so far resisted legal commitments. Additionally, because many of them simply do not set a price on carbon, they can produce cheaper carbon-intensive goods. Promoters of carbon tariffs thus think that taxing such goods at the border will make up for this difference in price and indirectly regulate the associated emissions.

However, almost a quarter of China’s CO2 emissions come from its

exports. So China and other nations view carbon tariffs as trade sanctions and protectionism. They even threatened to start a “trade war” if such schemes were to be put into place. They stress the role that carbon emissions have played in the industrialization of advanced economies and demand increased financial aid in order to reduce their emissions.

Carbon tariffs to finance clean development

To avoid this coming carbon war, Springmann proposes to recycle the tax revenues from carbon tariffs (claimed in the importing country) to the exporting country as investments in climate change mitigation and adaptation measures. This coupled scheme addresses the concerns about competitiveness and reducing emissions in one part of the world and economic progress in the other. Since it acknowledges the demand for imports as an emissions-causing factor, it may therefore represent a consensus solution within a global climate policy. According to Springmann, a preliminary assessment has indicated that the revenue from this scheme would range between $8 and $50 billion per year, depending on the price of carbon. In comparison, at the climate summit in Copenhagen in 2009, it was agreed to create a “Fast Start Fund” to support climate adaptation and clean technology in developing countries. The pledged contribution is $30 billion over the next three years. Carbon tariffs would add significant revenue streams to this effort."

Go to original AXA article by Marco Springmann (3 years)


 Related: Young people’s burden: requirement of negative CO2 emissions: Hansen et al


carbon tariffs, carbon footprint, impose trade tariffs on carbon offenders, carbon trading, climate catastrophe, #economy,

We’re All Responsible for Climate Change — and That’s a Good Thing: Medium

We're all responsible for climate change

".......  That brings us to the issue of population growth. In 2017, the American Institute of Biological Sciences published an open letter signed by over 15,000 scientists, including Jane Goodall and E.O. Wilson, titled “World Scientists’ Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice.” It states, “We are jeopardizing our future by not reining in our intense but geographically and demographically uneven material consumption and by not perceiving continued rapid population growth as a primary driver behind many ecological and even societal threats.” It was the most scientists to ever co-sign a published journal article.

Be a patriot, eat less beef: grist

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As Josh Harkinson noted this week, cows are the United States’ single biggest source of methane — a potent gas that has 105 times the heat-trapping ability of carbon dioxide. That’s one major reason why beef’s greenhouse gas footprint is far higher than that of most other sources of protein, according to an EWG study. (Though it’s consumed at a fraction of the rate of beef or chicken, lamb is by far the most carbon intensive of the major meats, according to EWG, since the animal’s smaller body produces meat less efficiently but still produces a lot of methane.)

And EWG’s estimate of beef’s impact may actually be on the conservative side: A study released this week found the greenhouse gases associated with beef to be even higher.



So what should you eat instead of beef? One answer: Chicken, which has a carbon footprint roughly a fifth the size of beef’s.
Read grist article 

#veganism  #vegetarianism  #carbon footprint  #greenhouse gases  #meat  #chicken  #methane 

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