Commodity or Currency: How Carbon Credits Should be Traded To Achieve Environmental Integrity in Linked Cap-and-Trade Schemes
Abstract
Pursuant to the Paris Agreement, many countries intend to fulfill their carbon mitigation obligations by operating cap-and-trade schemes. While desirable, linking various cap-and-trade schemes to form a global carbon market is complex because it involves the collaboration of disparate schemes that governments have developed independently of each other. Because governments will design such schemes according to their own domestic priorities, heterogeneous carbon credits created from these schemes will have varying levels of environmental integrity. This thesis examines whether carbon credits should be traded like commodities or like currencies to achieve environmental integrity in linked cap-and-trade schemes. This thesis recommends that heterogeneous carbon credits should be traded like currencies by using carbon exchange rates that calibrate their varying carbon mitigation values to make them truly fungible. A carbon currency trading model will ensure the environmental integrity of linked cap-and-trade schemes to collectively mitigate climate change on an international scale.
Description
Keywords
Law, Political Science--International Law and Relations, Public Administration, Engineering--Environmental
Citation
Yam, J. V. (2016). Commodity or Currency: How Carbon Credits Should be Traded To Achieve Environmental Integrity in Linked Cap-and-Trade Schemes (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/25357