Voluntary environmental management programs for firms have become an increasingly popular instrument of environmental policy. However, the literature's conclusion on the effectiveness of such programs is ambiguous, and for the European region there is a lack of evidence based on a large control...

We investigate the effect of the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) on the economic performance of manufacturing firms in Germany. Our difference-in-differences framework relies on several parametric conditioning strategies and nearest neighbor matching. As a measure of economic...

Social norms can help to foster cooperation and to overcome the free-rider problem in private provision of public goods. This paper focuses on the enforcement of social norms by a self-introduced punishment and reward scheme. We analyse if subjects achieve to implement a norm-enforcement...

CO2 emissions mandates for new light-duty passenger vehicles have recently been adopted in the European Union (EU), which require steady reductions to 95 g CO2/km in 2021. Using a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model, we analyze the impact of the mandates on oil demand, CO2 emissions, and...

This study explores whether negative income shocks from the COVID-19 pandemic affect the demand for environmental policy. By running a survey in Germany in May 2020, we show that there is a large and negative correlation between the COVID-19 income shocks and the willingness to support green...

Is trade liberalization contributing to cleaner production amongst manufacturing firms? Theoretical predictions and empirical evidences are mixed. This study utilizes China's dual trade regime and China's WTO entry in 2001 to construct a unique micro dataset on manufacturing firms for China for...

The ongoing transformation of the world’s energy systems requires an international monitoring to evaluate the transformation processes and to identify transferable leading practice policies. For this purpose, an independent scientific expert commission should be established for the G20. By...

From a current perspective the Paris Agreement is not sufficient to limit the global mean temperature below 2°C above pre-industrial level as intended. The Agreement stipulates that parties review, compare and ratchet up efforts to combat climate change over time. Within this process,...

From a current perspective the Paris Agreement is not sufficient to limit the global mean temperature below 2°C above pre-industrial level as intended. The Agreement stipulates that parties review, compare and ratchet up efforts to combat climate change over time. Within this process,...