Voici les éléments 1 - 10 sur 13
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Geographical spread of global emissions: Within-country inequalities are large and increasing
    In spite of the extensive literature on greenhouse gas emission inequalities at the world-wide level, most of the evidence so far has been based on country-level data. However, the within-country dimension matters for both the implementation and the policy formation of climate policies. As a preliminary step towards a better understanding of within-country inequalities, this paper measures their extent for the two major greenhouse gases, CO2 and CH4, over the 1970–2008 period. Using Theil-index decompositions, we show that within-country inequalities account for the bulk of global inequality, and tend to increase over the sample period, in contrast with diminishing between-country inequalities. Including differences across sectors reveals that between-sector inequalities matter more than between-country inequalities, and between-sector inequalities become the dominant source of global inequality at the end of the sample period in the CO2 case. Finally, estimated social tensions arising from the disconnection between emissions and future damages turn out to be increasing as soon as within-country disparities are taken into account. These orders of magnitude should be kept in mind while discussing the efficiency and fairness of alternative paths in combating global warming.
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Trade, Technique and Composition Effects: What is Behind the Fall in World-wide SO2 Emissions, 1990-2000?
    (C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers, 2007)
    de Melo, Jaime
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    ;
    Combining unique data bases on emissions with sectoral output and employment data, we study the sources of the fall in world-wide SO2 emissions and estimate the impact of trade on emissions. Contrarily to concerns raised by environmentalists, an emission-decomposition exercise shows that scale effects are dominated by technique effects working towards a reduction in emissions. A second exercise comparing the actual trade situation with an autarky benchmark estimates that trade, by allowing clean countries to become net importers of emissions, leads to a 10% increase in world emissions with respect to autarky in 1990, a figure that shrinks to 3.5% in 2000. Additionally, back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that emissions related to transport are of smaller magnitude, roughly 3% in both periods. In a third exercise, we use linear programming to simulate extreme situations where world emissions are either maximal or minimal. It turns out that effective emissions correspond to a 90% reduction with respect to the worst case, but that another 80% reduction could be reached if emissions were minimal.
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    The pollution terms of trade and its five components
    Based on two extensions, this paper proposes a re-appraisal of the concept of the pollution terms of trade (PTT) introduced by Antweiler (1996). First, detailed data allows capturing the effect of differences in emission intensities across countries and over time. Second, relying on Johnson and Noguera (2012), the revised PTT index controls for trade in intermediate goods and is based on value-added rather than gross output figures. Applied to a database for SO2 emission intensities for 62 developed and developing countries over the 1990?2000 period, it turns out that the first extension has a larger empirical importance than the second one. The global pattern is one in which the major rich economies exhibit a PTT index below one (higher pollution intensity in imports than in exports). Trade imbalances tend to exacerbate this asymmetry, allowing rich economies to further offshore their pollution through trade.
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Trade and Climate Policies: Do Emissions from International Transport Matter?
    (2013-12-17)
    Vöhringer, Frank
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    No abstract is available for this item.
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Is the World's Economic Center of Gravity Already in Asia?
    (Université de Lausanne, Faculté des HEC, DEEP, 2008) ;
    This paper proposes a simple measure of the World's Economic Center of Gravity (WECG) based on national GDP figures and the geographical location of the world's most important cities. This measure makes it possible to characterize the location of economic activity around the globe. It turns out that, over the 1975-2004 period, the WECG has shifted towards Asia, and the location of economic activity has become more evenly spread. On average, the distance to the WECG, which is highly correlated with the remoteness indicator frequently used in the trade gravity literature, has decreased more in Asian cities (-12%) and increased more in European cities (+16%).
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Global Manufacturing SO2 Emissions: Does Trade Matter?
    (2010-12-17) ; ;
    de Melo, Jaime
    No abstract is available for this item.
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Trade, Technique and Composition Effects: What is Behind the Fall in World-Wide SO2 Emissions 1990-2000?
    (Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei, 2007) ; ;
    de Melo, Jaime
    Combining unique data bases on emissions with sectoral output and employment data, we study the sources of the fall in world-wide SO2 emissions and estimate the impact of trade on emissions. Contrarily to concerns raised by environmentalists, an emission-decomposition exercise shows that scale effects are dominated by technique effects working towards a reduction in emissions. A second exercise comparing the actual trade situation with an autarky benchmark estimates that trade, by allowing clean countries to become net importers of emissions, leads to a 10% increase in world emissions with respect to autarky in 1990, a figure that shrinks to 3.5% in 2000. Additionally, back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that emissions related to transport are of the same magnitude. In a third exercise, we use linear programming to simulate extreme situations where world emissions are either maximal or minimal. It turns out that effective emissions correspond to a 90% reduction with respect to the worst case, but that another 80% reduction could be reached if emissions were minimal.
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    Industrial Location in Chinese Provinces: Does Energy Abundance Matter?
    (2014-7-1) ; ;
    Hotz, Irina
    We identify the driving factors of manufacturing activity across Chinese provinces with a particular focus on energy endowments. A model of production location is estimated, including both comparative advantage and economic geography determinants. The data set used consists of a panel of 28 Chinese provinces and 12 manufacturing industries over the period 1999-2009. Results confirm the relative importance of energy endowments. We find that larger energy endowments are significantly correlated with larger production of energy-intensive sectors. Disaggregating across energy carriers shows that coal exhibits the strongest impact. These results are robust across alternative specifications.
  • Publication
    Accès libre
    A Global Compass for the Great Divergence: Emissions vs. Production Centers of Gravity 1820‐2008
    We construct the world's centers of gravity for human population, GDP and CO2 emissions by taking the best out of five recognized data sources covering the last two centuries. On the basis of a novel distorsion‐free representation of these centers of gravity, we find a radical Western shift of GDP and CO2 emissions centers in the 19th century, in sharp contrast with the stability of the demographic center of gravity. Both GDP and emissions trends are reversed in the first half of the 20th century, after World War I for CO2 emissions, after World War II for GDP. Since then, both centers are moving eastward at an accelerating speed. These patterns are perfectly consistent with the lead of Western countries starting the industrial revolution, the gradual replacement of coal by oil and gas as alternative sources of energy, and the progressive catch up of Asian countries in the recent past.