IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/tcpoxx/v11y2011i2p851-864.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Perverse incentives under the CDM: an evaluation of HFC-23 destruction projects

Author

Listed:
  • LAMBERT RICHARD SCHNEIDER

Abstract

The clean development mechanism (CDM) under the Kyoto Protocol allows industrialized countries to use credits from greenhouse gas (GHG) abatement projects in developing countries. A key requirement of the CDM is that the emission reductions be real, measurable and additional. This article uses data from registered projects to evaluate the extent to which these objectives are met by projects that reduce hydrofluorocarbon-23 (HFC-23) emissions in the production of hydrochlorofluorocarbon-22 (HCFC-22). The data show that HCFC-22 plants produced significantly less HFC-23 during periods when no emission credits could be claimed compared with periods when HFC-23 destruction could be credited under the CDM. Moreover, the total amount of HCFC-22 produced appears to be determined mainly by CDM rules. This suggests that the claimed emission reductions may partly not be real and that the CDM provides perverse incentives to generate more HFC-23. The accelerated phase-out of HCFCs under the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer could worsen this situation. To address these issues an ambitious emission benchmark for the baseline HFC-23 emissions is proposed.

Suggested Citation

  • Lambert Richard Schneider, 2011. "Perverse incentives under the CDM: an evaluation of HFC-23 destruction projects," Climate Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(2), pages 851-864, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:tcpoxx:v:11:y:2011:i:2:p:851-864
    DOI: 10.3763/cpol.2010.0096
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.3763/cpol.2010.0096
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.3763/cpol.2010.0096?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Richard G. Newell & William A. Pizer & Daniel Raimi, 2014. "Carbon Markets: Past, Present, and Future," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 6(1), pages 191-215, October.
    2. Richard G. Newell & William A. Pizer & Daniel Raimi, 2013. "Carbon Markets 15 Years after Kyoto: Lessons Learned, New Challenges," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(1), pages 123-146, Winter.
    3. Erickson, Peter & Lazarus, Michael & Spalding-Fecher, Randall, 2014. "Net climate change mitigation of the Clean Development Mechanism," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 146-154.
    4. Mark Purdon, 2015. "Advancing Comparative Climate Change Politics: Theory and Method," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 15(3), pages 1-26, August.
    5. Trotter, Ian Michael & da Cunha, Dênis Antônio & Féres, José Gustavo, 2015. "The relationships between CDM project characteristics and CER market prices," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 158-167.
    6. Calel, Raphael & Colmer, Jonathan & Dechezlepretre, Antoine & Glachant, Matthieu, 2021. "Do carbon offsets offset carbon?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 113849, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    7. Calel, Raphael & Dechezlepretre, Antoine & Venmans, Frank, 2023. "Policing carbon markets," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 120565, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    8. Anne Berner, 2015. "Kurz zum Klima: CDM – wohin geht das Geschäft mit dem Klima?," ifo Schnelldienst, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 68(01), pages 64-66, January.
    9. Alistair Munro, 2021. "Comment on “Green Innovation and Finance in Asia”," Asian Economic Policy Review, Japan Center for Economic Research, vol. 16(1), pages 88-89, January.
    10. Arnaud Brohé, 2014. "Whither the CDM? Investment outcomes and future prospects," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 16(2), pages 305-322, April.
    11. Heath Milsom, Luke & Roland, Isabelle, 2021. "Minimum wages and the China syndrome: causal evidence from US local labor markets," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 113850, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    12. Raphael Calel, 2011. "Perverse incentives under the CDM: a comment," GRI Working Papers 53, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
    13. Strand, Jon & Rosendahl, Knut Einar, 2012. "Global emissions effects of CDM projects with relative baselines," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(4), pages 533-548.
    14. Purdon, Mark, 2015. "Opening the Black Box of Carbon Finance “Additionality”: The Political Economy of Carbon Finance Effectiveness across Tanzania, Uganda, and Moldova," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 462-478.
    15. Isla Globus‐Harris, 2020. "An Impossible Goal: When Trade Ratios Cannot Achieve No‐Net‐Loss," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 86(4), pages 1372-1392, April.
    16. Benedict S. Probst & Malte Toetzke & Andreas Kontoleon & Laura Díaz Anadón & Jan C. Minx & Barbara K. Haya & Lambert Schneider & Philipp A. Trotter & Thales A. P. West & Annelise Gill-Wiehl & Volker H, 2024. "Systematic assessment of the achieved emission reductions of carbon crediting projects," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-14, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:tcpoxx:v:11:y:2011:i:2:p:851-864. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/tcpo20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.