IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/tpr/restat/v103y2021i3p476-491.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Environmental Regulations and the Cleanup of Manufacturing: Plant-Level Evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Nouri Najjar

    (Western University)

  • Jevan Cherniwchan

    (Carleton University)

Abstract

For much of the industrialized world, pollution from manufacturing has been falling despite increased output. We examine how air quality standards---a common environmental regulation---have contributed to this cleanup of manufacturing. We develop a general equilibrium model to show how air quality standards can lead to a cleanup by causing reductions in plant emission intensity, relative changes in plant output, and plant entry and exit. We provide quasi-experimental evidence from Canada to highlight the magnitude of these responses. Our results suggest that air quality standards explain just under 40% of the cleanup of manufacturing.

Suggested Citation

  • Nouri Najjar & Jevan Cherniwchan, 2021. "Environmental Regulations and the Cleanup of Manufacturing: Plant-Level Evidence," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 103(3), pages 476-491, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:103:y:2021:i:3:p:476-491
    DOI: 10.1162/rest_a_00904
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1162/rest_a_00904
    Download Restriction: Access to PDF is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1162/rest_a_00904?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

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

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Leisner, Jonathan & Munch, Jakob R. & Nielsen, August Twile & Schaur, Georg, 2023. "The Impact of Offshoring and Import Competition on Firm-Level Carbon Emissions," IZA Discussion Papers 16556, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Choi, Pak-Sing & Espínola-Arredondo, Ana & Muñoz-García, Félix, 2022. "Environmental policy helping antitrust decisions: Socially excessive and insufficient merger approvals," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    3. Kumbhakar, Subal C. & Badunenko, Oleg & Willox, Michael, 2022. "Do carbon taxes affect economic and environmental efficiency? The case of British Columbia’s manufacturing plants," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    4. Jevan M. Cherniwchan & M. Scott Taylor, 2022. "International Trade and the Environment: Three Remaining Empirical Challenges," NBER Working Papers 30020, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Li, Zhen & Wu, Baijun & Wang, Danyang & Tang, Maogang, 2022. "Government mandatory energy-biased technological progress and enterprises' environmental performance: Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment of cleaner production standards in China," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    6. Filippo Belloc & Edilio Valentini, 2021. "Digging into Environmental Productivity: Is It All about Technology?," Department of Economics University of Siena 857, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    7. Felipe Avilés-Lucero & Gabriel Peraita & Camilo Valladares, 2023. "CO2 mitigation from a national accounts’ perspect," Economic Statistics Series 140, Central Bank of Chile.
    8. Li, Shuo & Wang, Min, 2022. "Environmental Regulation and Firms’ Extensive Margin Decisions," EfD Discussion Paper 22-15, Environment for Development, University of Gothenburg.
    9. Shinsuke Tanaka & Kensuke Teshima & Eric Verhoogen, 2022. "North-South Displacement Effects of Environmental Regulation: The Case of Battery Recycling," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 4(3), pages 271-288, September.
    10. Inma Martínez-Zarzoso & Shampa Roy-Mukherjee & Finn-Ole Semrau & Anca M. Voicu, 2020. "Pollution Reduction by Rationalization in Indian Firms," Working Papers 2020.01, International Network for Economic Research - INFER.
    11. Elisa Rottner & Kathrine Graevenitz, 2024. "What Drives Carbon Emissions in German Manufacturing: Scale, Technique or Composition?," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 87(9), pages 2521-2542, September.
    12. Sun, Chuanwang & Tie, Ying & Yu, Lili, 2024. "How to achieve both environmental protection and firm performance improvement: Based on China's carbon emissions trading (CET) policy," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    13. Arik Levinson, 2021. "Globalization and Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Evidence from the United States," Working Papers gueconwpa~21-21-01, Georgetown University, Department of Economics.
    14. Philippe Kabore & Nicholas Rivers, 2023. "Manufacturing output and extreme temperature: Evidence from Canada," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 56(1), pages 191-224, February.
    15. Kwon, Ohyun & Zhao, Hao & Zhao, Min Qiang, 2023. "Global firms and emissions: Investigating the dual channels of emissions abatement," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    16. Siewers, Samuel & Martínez-Zarzoso, Inmaculada & Baghdadi, Leila, 2024. "Global value chains and firms’ environmental performance," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    17. Choi, Jaerim & Hyun, Jay & Kim, Gueyon & Park, Ziho, 2023. "Trade Policy Uncertainty, Offshoring, and the Environment: Evidence from US Manufacturing Establishments," IZA Discussion Papers 15919, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Kevin Andrew & Jevan Cherniwchan & Mamoon Kader & Hashmat Khan, 2024. "Geography and the Technique Effect: Evidence from Canada," Department of Economics Working Papers 2024-08, McMaster University.
    19. Younes Ahmadi & Akio Yamazaki & Philippe Kabore, 2022. "How Do Carbon Taxes Affect Emissions? Plant-Level Evidence from Manufacturing," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 82(2), pages 285-325, June.

    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:tpr:restat:v:103:y:2021:i:3:p:476-491. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Kelly McDougall (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://direct.mit.edu/journals .

    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.