With climate change being such a threat to today’s society, it is important that governments continue to recognise the importance of mitigating the effects against it. Despite this, global carbon emissions continue to hit record levels, with many governments downplaying the severity and still lack the incentive to reach the United Nations’ goal of keeping the average global temperature well below 2°C – temperatures are expected to increase between 2.1°C and 2.9°C at the end of the century.
The main problem that arises is that the environment is seen as a public good – meaning that it is non-excludable and non-rivalrous. This is because air pollution is ‘mixed’ in the atmosphere, and hence all environmental damage will be experienced globally, no matter where it originates from. Expenditure to reduce carbon emissions may not benefit the country itself, but may benefit other countries (i.e. the free-riders) which may not invest anything at all on climate change. Therefore, governments are incentivised to invest in measures that mitigate against the effects of climate change, such as flood defence walls and relief centres, in which private benefits are experienced only by people in that specific country.
There are already certain regulations that are currently in place to reduce emissions, such as tradeable pollution permits, that are enforced in certain areas of the world such as the UK and Europe; this is particularly seen in the aviation industry. Tradeable pollution permits allow a firm to emit a given quantity of pollution, and if they go over it, they must buy permits from other firms. However, the practice is not widespread, and hence not effective on reducing emissions worldwide.
Therefore, I have identified two main criteria for a proposal on reducing emissions worldwide to work:
· Collaboration – ensuring that all countries, despite being in different economic stages, to engage in efforts.
· Monetary incentive – with a monetary incentive, this would have a direct impact on private costs and benefits for each country, and therefore incentivises countries to follow rules and regulations.
Using these two criteria, I have proposed reforming rules and regulations regarding climate change, such as the Paris Climate Accord, making use of the ideas from the tradeable pollution permit. The rules are set out as follows:
· It would be compulsory for all countries to engage in climate change efforts, with substantial fines yearly for those who do not engage with it. This would encourage greater collaboration between countries, realising that climate change is a global problem, not an individual country’s problem.
· Fines could be redirected to investing in greener, more sustainable technologies for developing countries.
· Each country will have a fixed quantity of pollution that they are allowed to pollute yearly, depending on their economic status. Developed countries who are able to invest in more greener technologies will have a stricter restriction than developing countries. This is to ensure that developing countries still have the ability to achieve economic growth.
· If a country goes over their limit, they would have to pay a fine.
· Countries who have consistently met their goal may have benefits to subsidies to promote greener growth, such as a public transportation infrastructure. Regular payments by countries to budget assessments for the United Nations would help finance it.
· Limits would be constantly changing to reflect the changes in environmental conditions and economic statuses of countries.
By adopting stricter rules with regards to climate change, with an introduction of a monetary incentive and the encouragement of collaboration, this would be able to incentivise countries to take an initiative and realise the potential dangers of a warming globe, hence limiting the effects at a large scale.
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