IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/eneeco/v34y2012is2ps198-s207.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Fair, optimal or detrimental? Environmental vs. strategic use of border carbon adjustment

Author

Listed:
  • Weitzel, Matthias
  • Hübler, Michael
  • Peterson, Sonja

Abstract

We carry out a detailed sensitivity analysis of border carbon adjustment (rates) by applying a global computable general equilibrium (CGE) GTAP7-based model. We find different incentives for the regions in the climate coalition to raise carbon-based border tax rates (BTAX) above the standard rate that mimics an equalisation of carbon prices across regions. Herein, the strategic use of BTAX (the manipulation of the terms of trade) is stronger for all coalition regions than the environmental use (the reduction of carbon emissions abroad). Higher BTAX can reduce carbon leakage but with a declining marginal effect. Furthermore, we find different incentives for regions outside the coalition to oppose high BTAX rates: Russia and the other energy exporters would oppose it, while the low-income countries would not because of benefits from the trade diversion effect. Thus, BTAX encourages the former to join the coalition, while compensating transfers are necessary to encourage the other (developing) countries including China and India.

Suggested Citation

  • Weitzel, Matthias & Hübler, Michael & Peterson, Sonja, 2012. "Fair, optimal or detrimental? Environmental vs. strategic use of border carbon adjustment," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(S2), pages 198-207.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:eneeco:v:34:y:2012:i:s2:p:s198-s207
    DOI: 10.1016/j.eneco.2012.08.023
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140988312001934
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

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

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert E. Hall & Charles I. Jones, 1999. "Why do Some Countries Produce So Much More Output Per Worker than Others?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 114(1), pages 83-116.
    2. Grossman, Gene M., 1980. "Border tax adjustments: Do they distort trade?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 117-128, February.
    3. Mustafa H. Babiker & Thomas F. Rutherford, 2005. "The Economic Effects of Border Measures in Subglobal Climate Agreements," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4), pages 99-126.
    4. John Kennan & Raymond Riezman, 2013. "Do Big Countries Win Tariff Wars?," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Raymond Riezman (ed.),International Trade Agreements and Political Economy, chapter 4, pages 45-51, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    5. Krugman, Paul, 1980. "Scale Economies, Product Differentiation, and the Pattern of Trade," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(5), pages 950-959, December.
    6. Hidemichi Yonezawa & Edward J. Balistreri & Daniel T. Kaffine, 2012. "The suboptimal nature of applying Pigouvian rates as border adjustments," Working Papers 2012-02, Colorado School of Mines, Division of Economics and Business.
    7. Hamilton, Bob & Whalley, John, 1983. "Optimal tariff calculations in alternative trade models and some possible implications for current world trading arrangements," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(3-4), pages 323-348, November.
    8. Rutherford, Thomas F, 1999. "Applied General Equilibrium Modeling with MPSGE as a GAMS Subsystem: An Overview of the Modeling Framework and Syntax," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 14(1-2), pages 1-46, October.
    9. Bhagwati, Jagdish & Mavroidis, Petros C., 2007. "Is action against US exports for failure to sign Kyoto Protocol WTO-legal?," World Trade Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 6(2), pages 299-310, July.
    10. Lessmann, Kai & Marschinski, Robert & Edenhofer, Ottmar, 2009. "The effects of tariffs on coalition formation in a dynamic global warming game," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 641-649, May.
    11. Finus, Michael, 2008. "Game Theoretic Research on the Design of International Environmental Agreements: Insights, Critical Remarks, and Future Challenges," International Review of Environmental and Resource Economics, now publishers, vol. 2(1), pages 29-67, June.
    12. John Kennan & Raymond Riezman, 2013. "Optimal Tariff Equilibria with Customs Unions," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Raymond Riezman (ed.),International Trade Agreements and Political Economy, chapter 5, pages 53-66, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    13. Meade, James E, 1974. "A Note on Border-Tax Adjustments," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(5), pages 1013-1015, Sept./Oct.
    14. Mayer, Wolfgang, 1984. "Endogenous Tariff Formation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(5), pages 970-985, December.
    15. Yilmaz, Kamil, 1999. "Optimal export taxes in a multicountry framework," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 439-465, December.
    16. Gros, Daniel, 1987. "A note on the optimal tariff, retaliation and the welfare loss from tariff wars in a framework with intra-industry trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(3-4), pages 357-367, November.
    17. Markusen, James R., 1975. "International externalities and optimal tax structures," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 15-29, February.
    18. Christian Broda & Nuno Limao & David E. Weinstein, 2008. "Optimal Tariffs and Market Power: The Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(5), pages 2032-2065, December.
    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. Cecilia Bellora & Lionel Fontagné, 2020. "Possible carbon adjustment policies: An overview," PSE-Ecole d'économie de Paris (Postprint) hal-02880332, HAL.
    2. Al Khourdajie, Alaa & Finus, Michael, 2020. "Measures to enhance the effectiveness of international climate agreements: The case of border carbon adjustments," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    3. Matthias Weitzel, 2017. "The role of uncertainty in future costs of key CO2 abatement technologies: a sensitivity analysis with a global computable general equilibrium model," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 153-173, January.
    4. Ling Tang & Qin Bao & ZhongXiang Zhang & Shouyang Wang, 2015. "Carbon-based border tax adjustments and China’s international trade: analysis based on a dynamic computable general equilibrium model," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 17(2), pages 329-360, April.
    5. Branger, Frédéric & Quirion, Philippe, 2014. "Would border carbon adjustments prevent carbon leakage and heavy industry competitiveness losses? Insights from a meta-analysis of recent economic studies," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 29-39.
    6. Christoph Böhringer & Jan Schneider & Emmanuel Asane-Otoo, 2016. "Trade In Carbon And The Effectiveness Of Carbon Tariffs," Working Papers V-388-16, University of Oldenburg, Department of Economics, revised Apr 2016.
    7. Bollen, Johannes, 2015. "The value of air pollution co-benefits of climate policies: Analysis with a global sector-trade CGE model called WorldScan," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 90(PA), pages 178-191.
    8. Kersting, Jan & Duscha, Vicki & Weitzel, Matthias, 2017. "Cooperation on climate change under economic linkages: How the inclusion of macroeconomic effects affects stability of a global climate coalition," Open Access Publications from Kiel Institute for the World Economy 226353, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
    9. Burmeister, Johannes & Peterson, Sonja, 2016. "National climate policies in times of the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS)," Kiel Working Papers 2052, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
    10. Hübler, Michael & Voigt, Sebastian & Löschel, Andreas, 2014. "Designing an emissions trading scheme for China—An up-to-date climate policy assessment," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 57-72.
    11. Peterson, Sonja & Weitzel, Matthias, 2014. "Reaching a climate agreement: Do we have to compensate for energy market effects of climate policy?," Kiel Working Papers 1965, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
    12. Calzadilla, Alvaro & Delzeit, Ruth & Klepper, Gernot, 2014. "DART-BIO: Modelling the interplay of food, feed and fuels in a global CGE model," Kiel Working Papers 1896, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
    13. Henry Thompson, 2013. "Energy Tariffs, Production, and Income in a Small Open Economy," Auburn Economics Working Paper Series auwp2013-11, Department of Economics, Auburn University.
    14. Pan, Wenqi & Kim, Man-Keun & Ning, Zhuo & Yang, Hongqiang, 2020. "Carbon leakage in energy/forest sectors and climate policy implications using meta-analysis," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    15. Schinko, Thomas & Bednar-Friedl, Birgit & Steininger, Karl W. & Grossmann, Wolf D., 2014. "Switching to carbon-free production processes: Implications for carbon leakage and border carbon adjustment," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 818-831.
    16. Jan Kersting & Vicki Duscha & Matthias Weitzel, 2017. "Cooperation on Climate Change under Economic Linkages: How the Inclusion of Macroeconomic Effects Affects Stability of a Global Climate Coalition," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4).
    17. Weitzel, Matthias, 2014. "Worse off from reduced cost? The role of policy design under uncertain technological advancement," Kiel Working Papers 1926, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
    18. Niven Winchester, 2018. "Can tariffs be used to enforce Paris climate commitments?," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(10), pages 2650-2668, October.
    19. Weitzel, Matthias & Peterson, Sonja, 2012. "Border carbon adjustment: Not a very promising climate policy instrument," Kiel Policy Brief 55, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
    20. Thompson, Henry, 2014. "Energy tariffs in a small open economy," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 63-67.
    21. Fang, Yuan & Yu, Yugang & Shi, Ye & Liu, Jie, 2020. "The effect of carbon tariffs on global emission control: A global supply chain model," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    22. Matthias Weitzel, 2017. "Who gains from technological advancement? The role of policy design when cost development for key abatement technologies is uncertain," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 19(1), pages 151-181, January.
    23. Ruth Delzeit & Malte Winkler & Mareike Söder, 2018. "Land Use Change under Biofuel Policies and a Tax on Meat and Dairy Products: Considering Complexity in Agricultural Production Chains Matters," Sustainability, MDPI, Open Access Journal, vol. 10(2), pages 1-1, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Climate policy; Border tax adjustment; Leakage; Trade diversion; Coalitions; General equilibrium model;

    JEL classification:

    • F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations
    • F18 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade and Environment
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming

    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:eee:eneeco:v:34:y:2012:i:s2:p:s198-s207. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Haili He). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eneco .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.