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U.S. Emissions Trading Markets for SO2 and NOx

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  • Burtraw, Dallas

    (Resources for the Future)

  • Szambelan, Sarah Jo

Abstract

The U.S. Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 initiated the first large experiment in the use of market-based regulation to control environmental problems with the introduction of an emissions trading program for sulfur dioxide emissions. Later that decade the second large trading program began for control of nitrogen oxide emissions. Although these programs are widely viewed as successful, their development and the emergence of associated environmental markets took various turns that provide lessons for the development of new markets, including markets for greenhouse gas emissions. This paper reviews the history of these programs and provides a glimpse of their future given the introduction of new regulations affecting multiple pollutants and given the expected implementation of climate policy.

Suggested Citation

  • Burtraw, Dallas & Szambelan, Sarah Jo, 2009. "U.S. Emissions Trading Markets for SO2 and NOx," RFF Working Paper Series dp-09-40, Resources for the Future.
    • Handle: RePEc:rff:dpaper:dp-09-40
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    File URL: http://www.rff.org/RFF/documents/RFF-DP-09-40.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Stowe, Robert C & Stavins, Robert Norman & Chan, Gabriel Angelo & Sweeney, Richard Leonard, 2012. "The SO2 Allowance Trading System and the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990: Reflections on Twenty Years of Policy Innovation," Scholarly Articles 8160721, Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
    2. Richard Schmalensee & Robert N. Stavins, 2013. "The SO 2 Allowance Trading System: The Ironic History of a Grand Policy Experiment," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(1), pages 103-122, Winter.
    3. Corjan Brink & Herman R.J. Vollebergh, 2020. "What Can We Learn from EU ETS?," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 18(01), pages 23-29, April.
    4. Beland, Louis-Philippe & Boucher, Vincent, 2015. "Polluting politics," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 176-181.
    5. Malleson, Tom, 2014. "After Occupy: Economic Democracy for the 21st Century," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199330102.
    6. Raphael Calel & Antoine Dechezleprêtre, 2016. "Environmental Policy and Directed Technological Change: Evidence from the European Carbon Market," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(1), pages 173-191, March.
    7. Jonathan M. Lee, 2015. "The Impact of Heterogeneous NOx Regulations on Distributed Electricity Generation in U.S. Manufacturing," Working Papers 15-12, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    8. Endre Tvinnereim, 2014. "The bears are right: Why cap-and-trade yields greater emission reductions than expected, and what that means for climate policy," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 127(3), pages 447-461, December.
    9. Shrimali, Gireesh & Tirumalachetty, Sumala, 2013. "Renewable energy certificate markets in India—A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 702-716.
    10. Helen Tammela Naughton, 2010. "Globalization and Emissions in Europe," European Journal of Comparative Economics, Cattaneo University (LIUC), vol. 7(2), pages 503-519, December.
    11. Jungho Lee & Shang-Jin Wei & Jianhuan Xu, 2020. "The Welfare Cost of a Current Account Imbalance: A "Clean" Effect," NBER Working Papers 27276, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Asian Development Bank Institute, 2017. "Asian Development Outlook 2016 Update: Meeting the Low-Carbon Growth Challenge," Working Papers id:11747, eSocialSciences.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    market-based regulation; Clean Air Act; electricity generation; air pollution; sulfur dioxide; nitrogen oxides;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H23 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Externalities; Redistributive Effects; Environmental Taxes and Subsidies
    • Q25 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Water
    • Q28 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Government Policy
    • D78 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Positive Analysis of Policy Formulation and Implementation

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