GHG mitigation of agricultural peatlands requires coherent policies

As soon as peat soil is drained for agricultural production, the peat starts to degrade, which causes emissions to the atmosphere. In countries with large peatland areas, the GHG mitigation potential related to management of these soils is often estimated as the highest amongst the measures available in agriculture. Although the facts are well known, the policies leading to diminished emissions are often difficult to implement. We have analysed the reasons why the mitigation potential is not fully utilized and what could be done better in national implementation of climate policies. Four cases are used to illustrate the necessary steps to reach mitigation targets: determining the amount and properties of peat soils, estimating the potential, costs and feasibility of the mitigation measures, and selecting and implementing the best measures. A common feature for all of the cases was that national and international climate policies have increased the public interest in GHG emissions from peat soils and increased the pressure for mitigation. Basically the same factors restrict the implementation of mitigation measures in all countries with significant peat soil areas. The most important of these is lack of policy coherence, e.g. ignoring climate policies when planning land use or agricultural policies. We conclude that GHG mitigation is achieved only if other policies, especially national regulations and strategies, are in line with climate policies.

Policy relevance

Agricultural peat soils could be used to help reach GHG mitigation goals in many countries, but the full potential of mitigation of peat soils is not used. Although peatland cultivation inevitably leads to loss of the whole peat layer and high emissions, there are few incentives or regulation to effectively minimize these losses. This article discusses the possibilities to reduce GHG emissions from agricultural peat soils, with specific emphasis on the barriers of implementing mitigation measures nationally. The lessons learned from the selected cases emphasize the role of all policy makers and their cooperation in planning coherent policies for achieving the goals determined by climate policies.     

Climate change mitigation strategies for agriculture: an analysis of nationally determined contributions,biennial reports and biennial update reports

The role of agriculture in the context of climate change is a complex issue. On the one hand, concerns about food security highlight the need to prioritize adaptation; on the other hand, the target of the Paris Agreement (keeping global temperature rise well below 2°C) cannot be achieved without a significant decrease in agricultural emissions. Various analyses of nationally determined contributions (NDCs) submitted under the Paris Agreement show how countries intend to prioritize the needs for adaptation and mitigation in the agricultural sector. This paper focuses on 46 countries that contribute 90% of global agricultural emissions and asks how they are addressing the agricultural sector in their climate mitigation policies. It takes into account that conditions and circumstances in countries vary significantly but might also indicate similar patterns. The analysis is based on information provided by countries in their NDCs, as well as their Biennial Reports (BRs) or Biennial Update Reports (BURs) under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). It further includes data on national agricultural emissions. By applying a mixed methods approach, which combines qualitative content analysis and comparative cluster analysis, we find that countries vary in their progress on agriculture and climate mitigation for many different reasons. These reasons include the national perception of the problem, divergent starting points for climate policy, particularities of the agricultural sector and, correspondingly, the availability of cost-effective mitigation technologies.

Key policy insights

• While for many countries the NDCs signify the beginning of their climate policy, UNFCCC biennial reports can be used to learn more about the policies that countries have already implemented.

• Mitigation action in the agricultural sector is emphasized most prominently in cases where co-benefits are possible and production is not impacted negatively.

• Policies and measures in the agricultural sector often do not align with the UNFCCC system of monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV). In addition to improving MRV-systems, it seems equally important to exchange national experiences with implemented measures and policies.

• The Koronivia Joint Work on Agriculture could take into account the problem of different definitions of sector boundaries and thus the importance of different mitigation measures.

     

Assessing the ambition of post-2020 climate targets: a comprehensive framework

One of the most fundamental questions surrounding the new Paris Agreement is whether countries’ proposals to reduce GHG emissions after 2020 are equally ambitious, considering differences in circumstances between countries. We review a variety of approaches to assess the ambition of the GHG emission reduction proposals by countries. The approaches are applied illustratively to the mitigation part of the post-2020 climate proposals (nationally determined contributions, or NDCs) by China, the EU, and the US. The analysis reveals several clear trends, even though the results differ per individual assessment approach. We recommend that such a comprehensive ambition assessment framework, employing a large variety of approaches, is used in the future to capture a wide spectrum of perspectives on ambition.

POLICY RELEVANCE

Assessing the ambition of the national climate proposals is particularly important as the Paris Agreement asks for regular reviews of national contributions, keeping in mind that countries raise their ambition over time. Such an assessment will be an important part of the regular global stocktake that will take place every five years, starting with a ‘light’ version in 2018. However, comprehensive methods to assess the proposals are lacking. This article provides such a comprehensive assessment framework.     

Climate action for food security in South Asia? Analyzing the role of agriculture in nationally determined contributions to the Paris agreement

The Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) submitted under the Paris Agreement propose a country’s contribution to global mitigation efforts and domestic adaptation initiatives. This paper provides a systematic analysis of NDCs submitted by South Asian nations, in order to assess how far their commitments might deliver meaningful contributions to the global 2°C target and to sustainable broad-based adaptation benefits. Though agriculture-related emissions are prominent in emission profiles of South Asian countries, their emission reduction commitments are less likely to include agriculture, partly because of a concern over food security. We find that income-enhancing mitigation technologies that do not jeopardize food security may significantly augment the region’s mitigation potential. In the case of adaptation, analysis shows that the greatest effort will be directed towards protecting the cornerstones of the ‘green revolution’ for ensuring food security. Development of efficient and climate-resilient agricultural value chains and integrated farming bodies will be important to ensuring adaptation investment. Potentially useful models of landscape level climate resilience actions and ecosystem-based adaptation are also presented, along with estimates of the aggregate costs of agricultural adaptation. Countries in the region propose different mixes of domestic and foreign, and public and private, adaptation finance to meet the substantial gaps.

Key policy insights

• Though substantial potential for mitigation of agricultural emissions exists in South Asia, governments in the region do not commit to agricultural emissions reductions in their NDCs.

• Large-scale adoption of income-enhancing technologies is the key to realizing agricultural mitigation potential in South Asia, whilst maintaining food security.

• Increasing resilience and profitability through structural changes, value chain interventions, and landscape-level actions may provide strong options to build adaptive capacity and enhance food security.

• Both private finance (autonomous adaptation) and international financial transfers will be required to close the substantial adaptation finance gap

     

Bookkeeping rather than climate policy making: national mitigation strategies in Western Europe

Climate change mitigation is a wicked problem that cuts horizontally across sectors and vertically across levels of government. To address it effectively, governments around the world, in particular in the EU, have developed several generations of multi-sectoral national mitigation strategies (NMS) since the early 1990s. Although NMS became the main effort to systematically coordinate mitigation policies, few works have studied them comparatively so far. The present article fills this gap by analysing how the EU-15 group of countries operationalized climate protection through NMS. First, we introduce the three roles policy strategies usually aim to fulfil: besides being policy documents they also represent governance processes (supposed to coordinate sectoral implementation), and capacity-building efforts. Empirically, we then explore the rationale, origins and prevalence of NMS. Subsequently, we characterize them as policy documents (with regards to their contents and structures) and as governance processes that address capacity building only implicitly. Based on existing assessments we finally review some performance indications of NMS. We find that in particular second- and third-generation NMS aimed to take their governance function seriously but resembled ‘lacklustre bookkeeping' of emissions, targets and mitigation options. Instead of approximating NMS towards their obviously overcharging governance function, we suggest to recalibrate them towards their communication and capacity-building function in a way that goes beyond bookkeeping.

Policy relevance

The present article shows that NMS fail to effectively govern climate change mitigation across a broad range of sectoral policy domains. Since most European countries have adopted not one but up to three generations of NMS since the 1990s, this finding is highly relevant for them – and for all others aiming to adopt similarly broad strategies. Instead of piling one strategy on top of another irrespective of their implementation, and instead of abolishing mitigation strategies altogether, we recommend recalibrating them towards what they can realistically accomplish: effective communication and capacity building so that NMS can advance from lacklustre bookkeeping to actively promoting a government-wide climate change mitigation vision. The article can help governments to realise that renewing integrated strategies such as NMS without overhauling them comes close to flogging a dead horse.     

Facilitating linkage of climate policies through the Paris outcome

The Durban Platform for Enhanced Action negotiations are likely to lead to a Paris outcome that embodies a hybrid climate policy architecture, combining top-down elements, such as for monitoring, reporting, and verification, with bottom-up elements, including ‘Intended Nationally Determined Contributions’ from participating countries, detailing plans to reduce emissions, based on national circumstances. For such a system to be cost-effective – and thus more likely to embody greater ambition – a key feature will be linkages among regional, national, and sub-national climate policies. By linkage, we mean formal recognition by a mitigation programme in one jurisdiction of emission reductions undertaken in another jurisdiction for the purposes of complying with the first jurisdiction's requirements. The Paris outcome could play at least four different roles with respect to linkage of heterogeneous policy instruments. First, it could discourage linkage, either by not allowing countries to count international transfers toward their mitigation contributions, or by limiting the number or types of transferred units that can be counted for compliance purposes. Second, it could be silent on the topic of linkage, creating legal and regulatory uncertainty about whether international transfers are allowed. Third, it could expressly authorize linkage but not provide any further details about how linkage should occur, leaving it to future United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change negotiating sessions to work out the details or to national governments to develop bilateral or multilateral linkage arrangements. Finally, the Paris outcome could establish institutional arrangements and rules that facilitate and promote linkage. We examine how a future international policy architecture could help facilitate the growth and operation of a robust system of international linkages. Several design elements merit serious consideration for inclusion in the Paris outcome, either in the core agreement or by establishing a process for subsequent international elaboration. At the same time, including detailed linkage rules in the core agreement is not desirable because this could make it difficult for rules to evolve in light of experience.

Policy relevance

These findings have implications for the efficient and effective design of an international climate policy architecture by detailing the role that linkage can play in supporting heterogeneous climate policies at the regional, national, and sub-national levels.     

The contribution of forest carbon credit projects to addressing the climate change challenge

This article addresses the question of how forestry projects, given the recently improved standards for the accounting of carbon sequestration, can benefit from existing and emerging carbon markets in the world. For a long time, forestry projects have been set up for the purpose of generating carbon credits. They were surrounded by uncertainties about the permanence of carbon sequestration in trees, potential replacement of deforestation due to projects (leakage), and how and what to measure as sequestered carbon. Through experience with Joint Implementation (JI) and Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) forestry projects, albeit limited, and with forestry projects in voluntary carbon markets, considerable improvements have been made with accounting of carbon sequestration in forests, resulting in a more solid basis for carbon credit trading. The scope of selling these credits exists both in compliance markets, although currently with strong limitations, and in voluntary markets for offsetting emissions with carbon credits. Improved carbon accounting methods for forestry investments can also enhance the scope for forestry in the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) that countries must prepare under the Paris Agreement.

POLICY RELEVANCE

This article identifies how forestry projects can contribute to climate change mitigation. Forestry projects have addressed a number of challenges, like reforestation, afforestation on degraded lands, and long-term sustainable forest management. An interesting new option for forestry carbon projects could be the NDCs under the Paris Agreement in December 2015. Initially, under CDM and JI, the number of forestry projects was far below that for renewable energy projects. With the adoption of the Paris Agreement, both developed and developing countries have agreed on NDCs for country-specific measures on climate change mitigation, and increased the need for investing in new measures. Over the years, considerable experience has been built up with forestry projects that fix CO₂ over a long-term period. Accounting rules are nowadays at a sufficient level for the large potential of forestry projects to deliver a reliable, additional contribution towards reducing or halting emissions from deforestation and forest degradation activities worldwide.     

The challenges of monitoring national climate policy: learning lessons from the EU

One of the most central and novel features of the new climate governance architecture emerging from the 2015 Paris Agreement is the transparency framework committing countries to provide, inter alia, regular progress reports on national pledges to address climate change. Many countries will rely on public policies to turn their pledges into action. This article focuses on the EU’s experience with monitoring national climate policies in order to understand the challenges that are likely to arise as the Paris Agreement is implemented around the world. To do so, the research employs – for the first time – comparative empirical data submitted by states to the EU’s monitoring system. Our findings reveal how the EU’s predominantly technical interpretation of four international reporting quality criteria – an approach borrowed from reporting on GHG fluxes – has constrained knowledge production and stymied debate on the performance of individual climate policies. Key obstacles to more in-depth reporting include not only political concerns over reporting burdens and costs, but also struggles over who determines the nature of climate policy monitoring, the perceived usefulness of reporting information, and the political control that policy knowledge inevitably generates. Given the post-Paris drive to achieve greater transparency, the EU’s experience offers a sobering reminder of the political and technical challenges associated with climate policy monitoring, challenges that are likely to bedevil the Paris Agreement for decades to come.

Policy relevance

The 2009 Copenhagen summit ushered in a more bottom-up system of international climate governance. Such systems typically depend on strong monitoring approaches to assess past performance and estimate future national contributions over time. This article shows why decision makers at multiple governance levels should pay serious attention to empirical data on the experiences and challenges that have emerged around monitoring in the EU, a self-proclaimed climate leader. The analysis highlights key political and administrative challenges that policy makers will likely encounter in implementing climate policy monitoring and ensuring transparency in the spirit of the Paris Agreement.     

The impact of shale gas on the costs of climate policy

The use of shale gas is commonly considered as a low-cost option for meeting ambitious climate policy targets. This article explores global and country-specific effects of increasing global shale gas exploitation on the energy markets, on greenhouse gas emissions, and on mitigation costs. The global techno-economic partial equilibrium model POLES (Prospective Outlook on Long-term Energy Systems) is employed to compare policies which limit global warming to 2°C and baseline scenarios when the availability of shale gas is either high or low. According to the simulation results, a high availability of shale gas has rather small effects on the costs of meeting climate targets in the medium and long term. In the long term, a higher availability of shale gas increases baseline emissions of greenhouse gases for most countries and for the world, and leads to higher compliance costs for most, but not all, countries. Allowing for global trading of emission certificates does not alter these general results. In sum, these findings cast doubt on shale gas’s potential as a low-cost option for meeting ambitious global climate targets.

POLICY RELEVANCE

Many countries with a large shale gas resource base consider the expansion of local shale gas extraction as an option to reduce their GHG emissions. The findings in this article imply that a higher availability of shale gas in these countries might actually increase emissions and mitigation costs for these countries and also for the world. An increase in shale gas extraction may spur a switch from coal to gas electricity generation, thus lowering emissions. At the global level and for many countries, though, this effect is more than offset by a crowding out of renewable and nuclear energy carriers, and by lower energy prices, leading to higher emissions and higher mitigation costs in turn. These findings would warrant a re-evaluation of the climate strategy in most countries relying on the exploitation of shale gas to meet their climate targets.     

What explains public support for climate policies? A review of empirical and experimental studies

The lack of broad public support prevents the implementation of effective climate policies. This article aims to examine why citizens support or reject climate policies. For this purpose, we provide a cross-disciplinary overview of empirical and experimental research on public attitudes and preferences that has emerged in the last few years. The various factors influencing policy support are divided into three general categories: (1) social-psychological factors and climate change perception, such as the positive influences of left-wing political orientation, egalitarian worldviews, environmental and self-transcendent values, climate change knowledge, risk perception, or emotions like interest and hope; (2) the perception of climate policy and its design, which includes, among others, the preference of pull over push measures, the positive role of perceived policy effectiveness, the level of policy costs, as well as the positive effect of perceived policy fairness and the recycling of potential policy revenues; (3) contextual factors, such as the positive influence of social trust, norms and participation, wider economic, political and geographical aspects, or the different effects of specific media events and communications. Finally, we discuss the findings and provide suggestions for future research.

Policy relevance

Public opinion is a significant determinant of policy change in democratic countries. Policy makers may be reluctant to implement climate policies if they expect public opposition. This article seeks to provide a better understanding of the various factors influencing public responses to climate policy proposals. Most of the studied factors include perceptions about climate change, policy and its attributes, all of which are amenable to intervention. The acquired insights can thus assist in improving policy design and communication with the overarching objective to garner more public support for effective climate policy.     

Health co-benefits and the development of climate change mitigation policies in the European Union

The 2015 Paris Agreement requires increasingly ambitious emissions reduction efforts from its member countries. Accounting for ancillary positive health outcomes (health co-benefits) that result from implementing climate change mitigation policies can provide Parties to the Paris Agreement with a sound rationale for introducing stronger mitigation strategies. Despite this recognition, a knowledge gap exists on the role of health co-benefits in the development of climate change mitigation policies. To address this gap, the case study presented here investigates the role of health co-benefits in the development of European Union (EU) climate change mitigation policies through analysis and consideration of semi-structured interview data, government documents, journal articles and media releases. We find that while health co-benefits are an explicit consideration in the development of EU climate change mitigation policies, their influence on final policy outcomes has been limited. Our analysis suggests that whilst health co-benefits are a key driver of air pollution mitigation policies, climate mitigation policies are primarily driven by other factors, including economic costs and energy implications.

Key policy insights

• Health co-benefits are quantified and monetized as part of the development of EU climate change mitigation policies but their influence on the final policies agreed upon is limited.

• Barriers, such as the immediate economic costs associated with climate action, inhibit the influence of health co-benefits on the development of mitigation policies.

• Health co-benefits primarily drive the development of EU air pollution mitigation policies.

• The separation of responsibility for GHG and non-GHG emissions across Directorate Generals has decoupled climate change and air pollution mitigation policies, with consequences for the integration of health co-benefits in climate policy.

     

The nexus between nationally determined contributions and technology needs assessments: a global analysis

The role of technology in combatting climate change through mitigation and adaptation to its inevitable impacts has been acknowledged and highlighted by the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). In the developing world, this has received particular attention through the technology needs assessment (TNA) process. As Parties put forward their national pledges to combat climate change, the scarcity of resources makes it important to assess (i) whether national processes designed to tackle climate change are working together and (ii) whether existing national processes should be terminated with the initiation of new ones. This study presents an assessment of the existing TNA process and its linkages to the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement. The conclusions stem from an assessment of the TNAs completed to date, as well as 71 NDCs from developing countries at various stages of the TNA process. The analyses show that further developing the TNAs could play a vital role in filling gaps in the existing NDCs, specifically those relating to identifying appropriate technologies, their required enabling framework conditions and preparing implementation plans for their transfer and diffusion.

Key policy insights

• The full potential of the TNAs has still to be rolled out in many countries.

• Developing countries can maximize the potential of their TNAs by further developing them to explicitly analyse what is needed to implement existing NDCs, including by better aligning their focus, scope and up-to-dateness with the priority sectors included in the NDCs.

• Requests of developing countries for international assistance, through technology transfer, will be better guided by the completion of the TNA process.

• Policies for strengthening the NDCs will benefit from the results of completed, ongoing and future TNA processes.

     

Social impacts of climate change mitigation policies and their implications for inequality

The Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set ambitious targets for environmental, economic and social progress. Climate change mitigation policies play a central role in this process. To maximize the benefits and minimize the negative effects of climate change mitigation policies, policymakers need to be aware of the indirect and often complex social and inequality impacts that these policies may have and the pathways through which these impacts emerge. Better understanding of the distributional and inequality impacts is important to avoid negative social and distributional outcomes as countries ratchet up their climate policy ambition in the post-Paris context. This paper synthesizes evidence from the existing literature on social co-impacts of climate change mitigation policy and their implications for inequality. The analysis shows that most policies are linked to both co-benefits and adverse side-effects, and can compound or lessen inequalities depending on contextual factors, policy design and policy implementation. The risk of negative outcomes is greater in contexts characterized by high levels of poverty, corruption and economic and social inequalities, and where limited action is taken to identify and mitigate potentially adverse side-effects.

Key policy insights

• The risk of adverse social outcomes associated with climate change mitigation policies, including worsening inequality, increases as countries ratchet up their ambition to meet the Paris Agreement targets. Many policies that have so far only been piloted will need to be up-scaled.

• Negative inequality impacts of climate policies can be mitigated (and possibly even prevented), but this requires conscious effort, careful planning and multi-stakeholder engagement. Best results can be achieved when potential inequality impacts are taken into consideration in all stages of policy making, including policy planning, development and implementation.

• Climate change mitigation policies should take a pro-poor approach that, in best case scenarios, can also lead to a reduction of existing inequalities.

     

The differentiated impact of emissions trading system based on company size

Most countries implementing an emissions trading system (ETS), such as EU member states, California in the US, or South Korea, are generally targeting large sized companies, which consume energy above a specific threshold. However, previous studies using computable general equilibrium (CGE) models have analyzed climate policies without considering company size. This may have led to inaccurate results because the impacts of climate policy would differ depending on the coverage of regulated companies. Accordingly, this study examines the environmental and economic impacts of greenhouse gas emission reduction policies, assuming policy results vary by firm size, as covered by the Korean emission trading system. To this end, a CGE model with a separate social accounting matrix based on company size is used to compare three scenarios that reflect different types of carbon pricing methods. The results show that greenhouse gases will be reduced to a lower extent and utility will decrease more if mitigation policies are only imposed to large companies.

Key policy insights

• Carbon pricing policies should consider the different impacts on companies of different sizes and industry sectors.

• Without considering the different sizes of companies covered by an ETS, the expected carbon price and its economic impact will be underestimated.

• Small and medium-sized companies will face more negative impacts than large companies in some industry sectors under an ETS, even if the mitigation burden is only faced by large companies.

     

Citizens' perceptions of justice in international climate policy: an empirical analysis

Relying on a recent survey of more than 3400 participants from China, Germany, and the US, this article empirically analyses citizens' perceptions of key guiding principles for sharing mitigation costs across countries, justification of climate policy and trust in climate policy. Our findings suggest that the ranking of the main principles for burden-sharing is identical in China, Germany, and the US: accountability followed by capability, egalitarianism, and sovereignty. Thus, on a general level, citizens across these countries seem to have a common (normative) understanding of fairness. We therefore find no evidence that citizens' (stated) fairness preferences are detrimental to future burden-sharing agreements. In all three countries a majority of citizens considers international climate policy to be justified, but citizens' perceptions differ across specific items and countries. Finally, a substantial portion of citizens in all countries exhibit a lack of trust in international climate agreements.

Policy relevance

Disagreement over the distribution of mitigation costs across countries is blocking current negotiations about a new international climate change agreement to be adopted in 2015. At the heart of this disagreement are different perceptions of distributive justice among those involved in climate policy making. Our findings show that there is no difference in the ranking of fairness principles across citizens in China, Germany, and the US, suggesting that the common ground for crafting a future agreement is larger than expected. In particular, the accountability principle should weigh heavily when deciding on the burden-sharing. In addition, our findings suggest that in order to gain support among citizens, international climate policy may need to take measures to improve trust.     

Policy without politics: technocratic control of climate change adaptation policy making in Nepal

As developing countries around the world formulate policies to address climate change, concerns remain as to whether the voices of those most exposed to climate risk are represented in those policies. Developing countries face significant challenges for contextualizing global-scale scientific research into national political dynamics and downscaling global frameworks to sub-national levels, where the most affected are presumed to live. This article critiques the ways in which the politics of representation and climate science are framed and pursued in the process of climate policy development, and contributes to an understanding of the relative effectiveness of globally framed, generic policy mechanisms in vulnerable and politically volatile contexts. Based on this analysis, it also outlines opportunities for the possibility of improving climate policy processes to contest technocratic framing and generic international adaptation solutions.

Policy relevance

Nepal's position as one of the countries most at risk from climate change in the Himalayas has spurred significant international support to craft climate policy responses over the past few years. Focusing on the National Adaptation Programme of Action (NAPA) and the Climate Change Policy, this article examines the extent to which internationally and scientifically framed climate policy in Nepal recognizes the unfolding political mobilizations around the demand for a representative state and equitable adaptation to climate risks. This is particularly important in Nepal, where political unrest in the post-conflict transition after the end of the civil war in 2006 has focused around struggles over representation for those historically on the political margins. Arguing that vulnerability to climate risk is produced in conjunction with social and political conditions, and that not everyone in the same locality is equally vulnerable, we demonstrate the multi-faceted nature of the politics of representation for climate policy making in Nepal. However, so far, this policy making has primarily been shaped through a technocratic framing that avoids political contestations and downplays the demand for inclusive and deliberative processes. Based on this analysis, we identify the need for a flexible, contextually grounded, and multi-scalar approach to political representation while also emphasizing the need for downscaling climate science that can inform policy development and implementation to achieve fair and effective adaptation to climate change.     

Could fiscal policies induce green innovation in developing countries? The case of Brazilian manufacturing sectors

Brazil is the first major developing country to pledge for absolute reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. This article explores the extent to which fiscal policies could contribute to this reduction and to greening the Brazilian economy. It was found that the use of green fiscal policies is at an early stage in Brazil, but a growing number of measures have been adopted in recent years led by subnational-level policies. An econometric analysis of 24 Brazilian manufacturing sectors for the years 2001–2008 shows that some fiscal instruments, such as low-cost (subsidized) finance for innovation and fiscal incentives for sustainable practices, have been effective in inducing green innovation. However, less than 14% of more than 100 thousand companies included in the study have adopted greener technologies. Even though Brazilian green fiscal policies have been rather uncoordinated and ad hoc, their significant impact on the uptake of green technologies indicates these can play an important role in a transition to a green economy.

POLICY RELEVANCE

Faced with the challenge of reducing its greenhouse gas emissions in absolute terms, Brazil now needs to put in place policies to help deliver the country’s pledge. This article analyses which fiscal policies should be adopted and how these policies could form part of a low carbon policy framework in the country. Among our policy-relevant findings is that subnational green fiscal policies are relatively less complex to introduce and encourage uptake of green technologies. Thus, they could be an entry point to a wider green fiscal policy strategy. We also found that fiscal incentives for green innovation projects can present more than proportional impact on the uptake of green technologies owing to positive feedbacks, increasing returns to scale and spill-overs. These are attractive features of green innovations to developing countries in addition to environmental benefits, as they favour the accumulation of indigenous technological capabilities that are critical for long-term technological and economic development. These lessons learned from green fiscal policies in Brazil are applicable to other developing countries.     

Could baseline establishment be counterproductive for emissions reduction? Insights from Vietnam’s building sector

This article provides insights into the role of institutions involved in climate governance working towards a future low-carbon society at the national level, within the global climate change governance architecture. Specifically, it contributes to understanding the fragmented governance of energy efficiency policy in developing countries by focussing on Vietnam’s building sector, identifying key institutions related to underlying discourses, national and international power relations, resource distribution and coalitions. It uses the case of baseline setting in developing Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs) to illustrate institutional dynamics, nationally and transnationally, as well as to question whether demands for baseline setting achieve the ideal trade-off between actual GHG emissions reduction and institutionalized demands for accountability. The analysis reveals that, in addition to domestic efforts and challenges, the international agenda greatly influences the energy efficiency policy arena. The article presents lessons to be learnt about policy processes from the specific Vietnamese case, reflecting on the role of international actors and discourses in it. Finally, it argues for the abolition of baselines in favour of adequate monitoring and evaluation, from the perspective that requirement for deviation from fictitious baselines is unproductive and only serves an international techno-managerial discourse.

POLICY RELEVANCE

Baseline establishment is commonly considered an initial step in developing NAMAs, in order to facilitate the demonstration of a deviation from such baselines. The requirement to produce baselines is traditionally not questioned by policy practitioners. Thus, significant development resources are allocated to the establishment of baselines and the bridging of data gaps, often without consideration as to whether baselines are a necessary instrument for NAMA implementation. We suggest omitting the lengthy and resource-consuming practice of establishing baselines and recommend proceeding forthwith to the planning and implementation of mitigation and energy efficiency policies. As conditions vary significantly in different contexts, it would be more appropriate to measure the initial situation, establishing the ‘base point’, and monitor development from that point. The present article might serve as motivation for policymakers to question traditional approaches to policy development and consider alternatives to maximize the cost efficacy of NAMA programmes and facilitate their implementation.     

Mainstreaming climate change adaptation into inland aquaculture policies in Thailand

While there have been many pilot projects on adaptation undertaken in the fisheries and aquaculture sector, state policies are only just beginning to address let alone refer to climate change. This study explores the climate-related content, climate sensitivities, and opportunities to incorporate climate change concerns in a set of aquaculture policies by the government of Thailand. The analysis is based on content analysis of policy documents and in-depth interviews with 14 officials that had roles in the design or implementation of 8 Department of Fisheries policies. The Aquaculture Master Plan 2011–2016 and the now abandoned Tilapia Strategy refer directly to climate variability or change. The Master Plan also suggests measures or strategies, such as investment in research, and the transfer of technologies, which would be helpful to sustainability and adaptation. Other policies suggest, or at the very least include, practices which could contribute to strengthening management of climate-related risks, for example: a registration policy included provisions for compensation; extension programme policy recognizes the importance of extreme events; and a standards policy gives guidance on site selection and water management. Most existing aquaculture policies appear to be sensitive to the impacts of climate change; for instance, the zoning policy is sensitive to spatial shifts in climate. Stakeholders had ideas on how policies could be made more robust; in the case of zoning, by periodically reviewing boundaries and adjusting them as necessary.

POLICY RELEVANCE

This study is one of the first evaluations of the coverage and sensitivity of aquaculture policies to climate change. It shows that while existing policies in Thailand are beginning to refer explicitly to climate change, they do not yet include much in the way of adaptation responses, underlining the need for identifying entry points as has been done in this analysis. Further mainstreaming is one option; another possibility is to adopt a more segregated approach, at least initially, and to collect various policy ideas under a new strategic policy for the aquaculture sector as a whole.     

Defining deep decarbonization pathways for Switzerland: an economic evaluation

This article simulates deep decarbonization pathways for a small open economy that lacks the usual avenues for large CO₂ reductions – heavy industry and power generation. A computable general equilibrium model is used to assess the energy and economic impacts of the transition to only one ton of CO₂ emissions per capita in 2050. This represents a 76% reduction with respect to 1990 levels, while the population is expected to be 46% larger and GPD to increase by 90%. The article discusses several options and scenarios that are compatible with this emissions target and compares them with a reference scenario that extrapolates already-decided climate and energy policy instruments. We show that the ambitious target is attainable at moderate welfare costs, even if it needs very high carbon prices, and that these costs are lower when either CO₂ can be captured and sequestered or electricity consumption can be taxed sufficiently to stabilize it.

Policy relevance

In the context of COP 21, all countries must propose intended contributions that involve deep decarbonization of their economy over the next decades. This article defines and analyses such pathways for Switzerland, taking into consideration the existing energy demand and supply and also already-defined climate policies. It draws several scenarios that are compatible with a target of 1 ton of CO₂ emissions per capita in 2050. This objective is very challenging, especially with the nuclear phase out decided after the disaster in Fukushima and the political decision to balance electricity trade. Nevertheless, it is possible to design several feasible pathways that are based on different options. The economic cost is significant but affordable for the Swiss economy. The insights are relevant not only for Switzerland, but also for other industrialized countries when defining their INDCs.