By Gao Shiji & Huang Junyong, Research Team on “A Green- Low-Carbon and Circular-Economic Development Mode in the New Era”, Research Institute of Resources and Environment Policies, DRC

Research Report, No.277, 2020 (Total 6021) 2020-11-23

Abstract: Carbon pricing is a market-based means to internalize the external cost of carbon dioxide emissions, so as to reduce the production and consumption of high carbon-cost products through market mechanism and meet emission-reduction targets. Carbon pricing mainly includes carbon trading and carbon tax. Currently, 29 countries and regions in the world are engaged in carbon trading and 30 countries and regions have administered the levying and collection of carbon tax. In recent years, a group of economists in the United States have raised the option for the introduction of carbon tax, based on which a series of tax neutrality and carbon dividend distribution plans will be implemented. For many years, the EU has mainly relied on the carbon market to reduce emissions. At the end of 2019, it proposed 2050 carbon neutrality target and a package plan including the development of a carbon market and the collection of carbon tax, and also planned to impose carbon tariffs. Once implemented, these measures will have an immediate impact on China’s trade and exert a huge pressure on emission reduction in China. Therefore, we need to make a meticulous assessment of relevant countries’ carbon pricing, calculate the real cost of carbon at present and formulate pertinent measures for carbon pricing in advance in a bid to enable China to take an active part in international climate negotiations and promote the formation of a new global climate governance pattern.

Keywords: climate change, carbon pricing, climate club