Investment in energy efficiency could be key to carbon tax success
An ambitious tax on carbon emissions globally and the reinvestment of carbon revenues in energy efficiency could be game changers for the energy transition even if most countries still remain reluctant to entertain such ideas
Putting a high price on carbon could be a key instrument in the energy transition, but few countries are willing to embrace one and those that do tend to keep prices low. The debate is made more complicated by differences of opinion about the level at which carbon taxes should be set and about how revenues should be spent. New research suggests that reinvesting carbon revenues in energy efficiency programmes could be the best way to cut emissions
Carbon pricing hit the headlines this week as the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a group of leading scientists who advise governments, underlined the importance of increasing carbon prices to reduce emissions. A day later, the Nobel Prize committee announced it was giving this year’s economics award to William D. Nordhaus and Paul M. Romer for their research demonstrating how a global scheme of carbon taxes, uniformly imposed on all countries, would be “the most efficient remedy for the problems caused by greenhouse gas emissions”. ...
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