The European Commission (2001a) has recently presented a directive proposal to the Parliament and the Council in order to implement a tradable permits scheme. However, as stressed by the positive political economy, due to the influence of various interest groups, very few environmental policies...

A central question in climate policy is whether early investments in low-carbon technologies are a useful first step towards a more effective climate agreement in the future. We introduce a climate cooperation model with endogenous R&D investments where countries protect their international...

This paper discusses lessons that other regions could learn from European Union’s effort to implement carbon pricing through EU Emission Trading System (EU ETS). Our lessons are, first of all, that a cap-and-trade system like EU ETS is very helpful in guaranteeing a credible and binding...

Swiss climate policy consists of three regulatory instruments for greenhouse gas emissions reduction: A CO 2 levy, the Swiss Emissions Trading System (CH EHS), and an additional nonEHS" program for medium-sized plants that consists of command-and-control elements plus a sizeable abatement...

Megacities already account for a major part of global energy-related CO2 emissions with a strong tendency to increase; hence, future climate policy has to put a special emphasis on reducing big cities' energy consumption, especially in a world, where global climate negotiations are deadlocked....

Despite President Obama's current interest in climate policy, market-based climate policy on the US federal level still appears to be deadlocked. The same is true for Canada, which has aligned its climate policy to the US. However, regional activities are more promising as British Columbia and...

Domestic climate policy emissions trading schemes appear to be spreading all over the word. However, carbon markets in existence often suffer from dilution in terms of ecological effectiveness, economic efficiency, and social justice. Thus, in order to firmly base carbon markets on the main...

Trotz der klimapolitischen Zurückhaltung der USA auf der internationalen Ebene existieren innerhalb der USA Initiativen für klimapolitische Emissionshandelssysteme. Umgesetzt ist dabei bisher allein ein System im Nordosten, jedoch steht ein weiteres System im Westen kurz vor der Einführung...