Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/67851 
Year of Publication: 
2009
Series/Report no.: 
Queen's Economics Department Working Paper No. 1205
Publisher: 
Queen's University, Department of Economics, Kingston (Ontario)
Abstract: 
In this paper, we characterize a mechanism for reducing pollution emis sions in which countries, acting non-cooperatively, commit to match each others' abatement levels and may subsequently engage in emissions quota trading. The an alysis shows that the mechanism leads to efficient outcomes. The level of emissi ons is efficient, and if the matching abatements process includes a quota tradin g stage, the marginal benefits of emissions are also equalized across countries. Given the equilibrium matching rates, the initial allocation of emission quotas (before trading) reflects each country's marginal valuation for lower pollution relative to its marginal benefit from emissions. These results hold for any number of countries, in an environment where countries have different abatement technologies and different benefits from emissions, and even if the emissions of countries are imperfect substitutes in each country's damage function. In a dynamic two-period setting, the mechanism achieves both intra-temporal and inter-temporal efficiency. We extend the model by assuming that countries are voluntarily contributing to an international public good, in addition to undertaking pollution abatements, and find that the level of emissions may be efficient even without any matching abatement commitments, and the marginal benefits of emissions may be equalized across countries even without quota trading.
Subjects: 
voluntary pollution abatement
matching commitments
emissions quota trading
JEL: 
H23
H41
H87
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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