IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cpp/issued/v39y2013is2p37-52.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Tale of Two Climate Policies: Political Economy of British Columbia's Carbon Tax and Clean Electricity Standard

Author

Listed:
  • Ekaterina Rhodes
  • Mark Jaccard

Abstract

In 2007-08, British Columbia implemented two significant climate policies: the first broadly based carbon tax and the first almost 100-percent "clean" electricity standard in North America. We describe the key design characteristics of these policies and analyse them against the criteria of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions, economic efficiency, administrative feasibility, and public acceptance. We find that the clean electricity standard is estimated to reduce four to six times more emissions per year by 2020 than the carbon tax, but at an average cost per tonne of CO 2 reduced that is significantly higher than the carbon tax at its current level. Interestingly, the clean electricity standard achieves higher and steadier levels of public acceptance, which might be attributed to its lack of visibility, relative to the carbon tax.

Suggested Citation

  • Ekaterina Rhodes & Mark Jaccard, 2013. "A Tale of Two Climate Policies: Political Economy of British Columbia's Carbon Tax and Clean Electricity Standard," Canadian Public Policy, University of Toronto Press, vol. 39(s2), pages 37-52, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpp:issued:v:39:y:2013:i:s2:p:37-52
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://economics.ca/cgi/jab?journal=cpp&view=v39s2/CPPv39s2p037.pdf
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: No access restriction except for the four most recent issues.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Murphy, Rose & Jaccard, Mark, 2011. "Energy efficiency and the cost of GHG abatement: A comparison of bottom-up and hybrid models for the US," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(11), pages 7146-7155.
    2. Raj Chetty & Adam Looney & Kory Kroft, 2009. "Salience and Taxation: Theory and Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1145-1177, September.
    3. Raj Chetty, 2009. "The Simple Economics of Salience and Taxation," NBER Working Papers 15246, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Daniel Kahneman & Jack L. Knetsch & Richard H. Thaler, 1991. "Anomalies: The Endowment Effect, Loss Aversion, and Status Quo Bias," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 5(1), pages 193-206, Winter.
    5. Lawrence Goulder, 1995. "Environmental taxation and the double dividend: A reader's guide," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 2(2), pages 157-183, August.
    6. Janet E. Milne & Mikael S. Andersen (ed.), 2012. "Handbook of Research on Environmental Taxation," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 13862.
    7. Amy Finkelstein, 2009. "E-ztax: Tax Salience and Tax Rates," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(3), pages 969-1010.
    8. Kallbekken, Steffen & Sælen, Håkon, 2011. "Public acceptance for environmental taxes: Self-interest, environmental and distributional concerns," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(5), pages 2966-2973, May.
    9. Bruvoll, Annegrete & Larsen, Bodil Merethe, 2004. "Greenhouse gas emissions in Norway: do carbon taxes work?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 493-505, March.
    10. Nicholas Rivers & Brandon Schaufele, 2012. "Carbon Tax Salience and Gasoline Demand," Working Papers 1211E, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Tvinnereim, Endre & Mehling, Michael, 2018. "Carbon pricing and deep decarbonisation," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 185-189.
    2. Jongmin Yu & Seokjong Ryu, 2018. "Optimal Design of a Politically Feasible Environmental Regulation," Korean Economic Review, Korean Economic Association, vol. 34, pages 75-99.
    3. Melton, Noel & Axsen, Jonn & Goldberg, Suzanne, 2017. "Evaluating plug-in electric vehicle policies in the context of long-term greenhouse gas reduction goals: Comparing 10 Canadian provinces using the “PEV policy report card”," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 381-393.
    4. Hasan, M.A. & Chapman, R. & Frame, D.J., 2020. "Acceptability of transport emissions reduction policies: A multi-criteria analysis," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    5. Carroll, Deborah A. & Stevens, Kelly A., 2021. "The short-term impact on emissions and federal tax revenue of a carbon tax in the U.S. electricity sector," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Johannes Abeler & Simon Jäger, 2013. "Complex Tax Incentives - An Experimental Investigation," CESifo Working Paper Series 4231, CESifo.
    2. James Alm & Carolyn J. Bourdeaux, 2013. "Applying Behavioral Economics to the Public Sector," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 206(3), pages 91-134, September.
    3. Rivers, Nicholas & Schaufele, Brandon, 2015. "Salience of carbon taxes in the gasoline market," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 23-36.
    4. Shanjun Li & Joshua Linn & Erich Muehlegger, 2014. "Gasoline Taxes and Consumer Behavior," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 302-342, November.
    5. Gilbert, Ben & Graff Zivin, Joshua S., 2020. "Dynamic corrective taxes with time-varying salience," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    6. Alejandro Ponce & Enrique Seira & Guillermo Zamarripa, 2017. "Borrowing on the Wrong Credit Card? Evidence from Mexico," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(4), pages 1335-1361, April.
    7. Nolan Ritter & Julia Anna Bingler, 2021. "Do homo sapiens know their prices? Insights on dysfunctional price mechanisms from a large field experiment," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 21/348, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    8. Nicola Lacetera & Devin G. Pope & Justin R. Sydnor, 2012. "Heuristic Thinking and Limited Attention in the Car Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(5), pages 2206-2236, August.
    9. Emmanuel Farhi & Xavier Gabaix, 2020. "Optimal Taxation with Behavioral Agents," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(1), pages 298-336, January.
    10. Arun Advani & Hannah Tarrant, 2021. "Behavioural responses to a wealth tax," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(3-4), pages 509-537, September.
    11. Goldin, Jacob, 2015. "Optimal tax salience," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 115-123.
    12. Burman, Leonard E. & Coe, Norma B. & Dworsky, Michael & Gale, William G., 2012. "Effects of Public Policies on the Disposition of Pre-Retirement Lump-Sum Distributions: Rational and Behavioral Influences," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 65(4), pages 863-887, December.
    13. Scott R. Baker & Stephanie Johnson & Lorenz Kueng, 2021. "Shopping for Lower Sales Tax Rates," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 209-250, July.
    14. Carl, Jeremy & Fedor, David, 2016. "Tracking global carbon revenues: A survey of carbon taxes versus cap-and-trade in the real world," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 50-77.
    15. Palmer, Karen & Walls, Margaret, 2015. "Does Information Provision Shrink the Energy Efficiency Gap? A Cross-City Comparison of Commercial Building Benchmarking and Disclosure Laws," RFF Working Paper Series dp-15-12, Resources for the Future.
    16. Roberto Dell'Anno & Vincenzo Maria De Rosa, 2013. "The Relevance of the Theory of Fiscal Illusion. The Case of the Italian Tax System," HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT AND POLICY, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2013(2), pages 63-92.
    17. Dmitry Taubinsky & Alex Rees-Jones, 2018. "Attention Variation and Welfare: Theory and Evidence from a Tax Salience Experiment," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 85(4), pages 2462-2496.
    18. Xavier Gabaix, 2017. "Behavioral Inattention," NBER Working Papers 24096, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Tyran, Jean-Robert & Stephens, Thomas A, 2012. "?At least I didn?t lose money? Nominal Loss Aversion Shapes Evaluations of Housing Transactions," CEPR Discussion Papers 9198, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    20. Michael Collins, J. & Urban, Carly, 2014. "The dark side of sunshine: Regulatory oversight and status quo bias," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PB), pages 470-486.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cpp:issued:v:39:y:2013:i:s2:p:37-52. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Iver Chong (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.utpjournals.press/loi/cpp .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.