Due to high carbon emission in production and low carbon emission in consumption, China is facing a severe test in economic development and carbon emission control. If the model of western developed countries is followed, it is likely that China will take the old road of high consumption and high emission while enhancing economic growth and living standard substantially. Therefore, a complete and systematic low carbon development pattern is very important to China. The core tenet of low carbon society is to coordinate the conflict between development and carbon emission reduction target. However, it does not emphasize only on the change of economic model but tries to create a completely new form of human society development through overall transformation of social mechanism, institutional design, regional planning and life style.
Many economists and policy makers advocate a fundamental shift towards “green growth” as the new, qualitatively-different growth paradigm, based on enhanced material/resource/energy efficiency and drastic changes in the energy mix. “Green growth” may work well in creating new growth impulses with reduced environmental load and facilitating related technological and structural change. But can it also mitigate climate change at the required scale (i.e. significant, absolute and permanent decline of GHG emissions at global level) and pace? This paper argues that growth, technological, population-expansion and governance constraints as well as some key systemic issues cast a very long shadow on the “green growth” hopes. One should not deceive oneself into believing that such evolutionary (and often reductionist) approach will be sufficient to cope with the complexities of climate change. It may rather give much false hope and excuses to do nothing really fundamental that can bring about a U-turn of global GHG emissions.
Quoting a joint analysis undertaken by the OECD and the IEA, G-20 leaders committed in September 2009 to "rationalize and phase out over the medium term inefficient fossil-fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption." This report draws on previous OECD work to assess the impact on international trade of phasing out fossil-fuel consumption subsidies provided mainly by developing and emerging economies. The analysis employed the OECD’s ENV-Linkages General-Equilibrium model and used the IEA’s estimates of consumer subsidies, which measure the gap existing between the domestic prices of fossil fuels and an international reference benchmark. It shows that a co-ordinated multilateral removal of fossil-fuel consumption subsidies over the 2013-2020 period would increase global trade volumes by a very small amount (0.1%) by 2020. While seemingly negligible, this increase hides the large disparities that are observed across countries (or regions) and products. Under the central scenario, which assumes a multilateral subsidy removal over the 2013-2020 period, trade in natural gas would be most affected, with a 6% decrease by 2020.
Denmark’s green growth strategy focuses on moving the energy system away from fossil fuels and investing in green technologies, while limiting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. On the whole, current policies should allow Denmark to reach near-term climate change targets, but may not be sufficient to achieve its most ambitious targets. The challenge is to achieve objectives in a cost-effective manner and to ensure that these ambitions contribute as much as possible to global GHG emissions mitigation and to stronger and greener growth in Denmark. Better exploiting interactions with EU and international policies, finding the appropriate way to support green technologies and reducing GHG emissions in sectors not covered by the EU emission trading scheme are key issues which need to be addressed to meet this challenge. This Working Paper relates to the 2012 OECD Economic Survey of Denmark.