Climate Change and Environmental Costs: A Review within the Framework of the Polluter Pays Principle

Many international climate regulations including the Paris Agreement, frequently emphasize the necessity of adaptation activities and greenhouse gas emission mitigation efforts to address the risks and threats arising from climate change. Similarly, achieving the objectives of "sustainable development," which give priority to economic, social, and ecological change, including mitigation and adaptation efforts, requires changes in the preferences and priorities of enterprises. In this regard, the "polluter pays principle (PPP)," which is desired to be more widely adopted by the private sector for dealing with climate change and sustainability initiatives, is a focus area of academic and political discussions. Because PPP is essential to distributing costs and duties among stakeholders and building a sustainable society and a more equal and just global climate policy, the practical dimension of the concept of polluter pays consists of the procedures used to calculate environmental costs. In addition, a company's reporting of its environmental costs and carbon emissions from production and consumption depends mainly on its reliable and comprehensive accounting and financial records. In this regard, the study's objective is to investigate the environmental costs in the context of PPP for addressing climate change. This study has found that it is imperative that the percentage of environmental expenses and carbon footprint in PPP production costs must be accurately calculated, recorded, and reported in order to remain competitive globally.