What is wrong with traditional climate policies? Negotiations past and present focus on regulating consumers or emitters, whether through quotas, carbon taxes or cap-and-trade systems – such as the EU scheme its parliament yesterday voted to prop up. The problem is that whenever some countries opt out of a global climate coalition such as the Kyoto protocol, the result is “carbon leakage”. If co-operating countries decide to cut back fossil fuel consumption, the world price declines and other nations can afford to buy more. Estimates of the magnitude of such leakage vary from 20 per cent to 25 per cent.
传统的气候政策有什么弊病？从过去到现在，气候谈判的主要思路均致在于监管消费者或排放者，无论是通过配额、碳排放税还是“限额与交易”(cap-and-trade)机制——比如几天前欧洲议会投票支持的欧盟(EU)项目。问题在于，只要有些国家选择不加入《京都议定书》(Kyoto Protocol)等manbetx app苹果 气候联盟，结果都会造成“碳泄漏”。如果合作国家决定减少化石燃料消费，那么全世界的化石燃料价格就会下跌，其他国家就可以买得起更多的化石燃料。据估计，碳泄露的比例从20%到25%不等。