The EU has proposed four flexibility mechanisms for the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions in the period 2013-2020: (1) the Emissions Trade Scheme (ETS), a permit market between selected companies; (2) trade in non-ETS allotments between Member States; (3) the Clean Development Mechanism...

The current EU proposal on greenhouse gas emission reduction has 28 targets for 2020: an EU-wide one for carbon dioxide emissions covered by the European Trading System, and one target for non-ETS emission per Member State. Implementation is necessarily more expensive than needed. I consider...

Under 2013 to 2020 European Union proposals for CO2 emission reduction, a Member State can transfer to another Member State ‘part’ of their allowed emission allocation in the non-Emission Trading Sector (“ETS”). The paper addresses three questions in relation to these Transfer Emission...

This paper warns against the risk of underestimating the costs -and the uncertainty about the costs- of achieving stringent stabilization targets. We argue that a straightforward review of integrated assessment models results produces biased estimates for the more ambitious climate objectives...

Three computable general equilibrium models are used to estimate the economic implications of a stylized version of EU climate policy. If implemented at the lowest possible cost, the 20% emissions reduction would lead to a welfare loss of 0.5-2.0% by 2020. Second-best policies increase costs. A...

In this paper, we study the impact of energy taxes and the EU ETS on a large number of firms in Europe between 1996 and 2007. Using company level micro-data, we examine how firms in different sectors were affected by environmental policies. Aspects of behaviour and performance studied include...