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Good subsidies or bad subsidies? Evidence from low-carbon transition in China's metallurgical industry

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  • Lin, Boqiang
  • Xu, Mengmeng

Abstract

Since the metallurgical industry has become the main source of China's carbon dioxide emissions and energy consumption in recent years, low-carbon transition in that industry is of great significance for achieving China's carbon reduction targets. It is generally believed that phasing out fossil fuel subsidies is an effective way to reduce energy-related CO2 emissions since it can increase the energy prices and lower its consumption. This paper aims to investigate whether the energy subsidy removal can promote the low-carbon transition of China's metallurgical industry. Taking inter-fuel and inter-factor substitution effects as the link, we calculate the CO2 mitigation potential on the assumption that the subsidies for each category of fossil energy were eliminated. We find that the metallurgical industry has a sluggish reaction to the changes in energy price. Supposing eliminating the energy subsidies in the period of 2003–2015, the amount of reduced CO2 would be 487.286 million tons, accounting for a slight proportion of the total emissions in the industry. But it is meaningful for the global CO2 mitigation since it approximates the whole CO2 emissions in Norway during the same period. These findings can provide some new insights for the energy subsidy issue and suggest that the additional measures are required to promote the low-carbon transition in China's metallurgical industry rather than just relying on the removal of fossil fuel subsidies.

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  • Lin, Boqiang & Xu, Mengmeng, 2019. "Good subsidies or bad subsidies? Evidence from low-carbon transition in China's metallurgical industry," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 52-60.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:eneeco:v:83:y:2019:i:c:p:52-60
    DOI: 10.1016/j.eneco.2019.06.015
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    5. Le Tang, 2020. "Energy prices and investment in energy efficiency: evidence from Chinese industry 1997–2004," Asian-Pacific Economic Literature, The Crawford School, The Australian National University, vol. 34(2), pages 93-105, November.
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    China's metallurgical industry; Fossil fuel subsidies; Low-carbon transition;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q01 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - General - - - Sustainable Development
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth
    • Q58 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environmental Economics: Government Policy
    • H23 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Externalities; Redistributive Effects; Environmental Taxes and Subsidies
    • L72 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Primary Products and Construction - - - Mining, Extraction, and Refining: Other Nonrenewable Resources

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