Doctoral Dissertation Research: Effects of Emissions Trading

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This project directly tests if and to what extent emissions trading results in the reduction it is designed to achieve. Specifically, this will help determine if emissions trading is associated with such reduction at both the city-level and at the firm-level on a global scale. The results will contribute relevant insight for addressing time-sensitive matters for formulation and implementation at national, state, and city levels. This includes but is not limited to the efficacy of emissions trading participation and whether alternative options such as a tax are more viable than a market approach. Results will contribute to greater efficacy in emissions reduction, which in turn is likely to yield long-term public health and national security dividends. This project uses original data on city-level emissions change for 269 cities from between 2000 and 2013 to be treated as a dependent variable in linear regression modeling. Controlling for many socio-economic and situational factors, two independent variables of interest will be tested for association with urban emissions change, derived from two sources: (1) a database comprising full firm-level transaction data for eight national emissions trading systems, and (2) a corporate emissions database, which comprises the emissions from 403 of the largest 500 companies in the world by market capitalization. First, emissions trading transactions will be collated from the firm-level to the city-level and tested for association with city-level emissions reduction. Second, corporate emissions change will be (a) tested as an independent variable against city-level emissions change to determine if corporate change influences the emissions change of the cities in which they reside; and then (b) tested as a dependent variable against emissions trading system participation as an independent variable, to determine whether participation in emissions trading influences corporate emissions reduction. Last, a qualitative analysis of cases both within and outside emissions trading systems will be performed, assessing on-the-ground processes associated with success and failure of emissions reduction by cities and firms.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.