A Systematic Literature Review on Carbon Financial Accounting

Abstract

The economic consequences of climate change and the function of carbon accounting in climate change have attracted increased attention from the research community. Although various studies have investigated climate change and carbon accounting, no systematic literature analysis has been conducted to provide a comprehensive overview of carbon financial accounting. Thus, the current paper gains insights into the key research domains and outlines future research directions and opportunities for carbon financial accounting by using systematic literature review. This paper adopts a methodological approach of systematic literature review, as suggested by Linnenluecke et al. (2020) with a final sample of 43 academic papers published from 2002 to 2022. Papers in this domain discuss seven topics: debates on IFRIC 3, the diversity of approaches to accounting practices, redefining emission allowance, valuation of emission allowance, a high level of non-disclosure, carbon accounting for sustainability governance, and responses of accountancy professionals. There are several issues to explore in future research, including investigating the interactions among different carbon accounting frames, applying new theoretical views and empirical methods to develop how decisions around carbon financial accounting are made, and providing more research on less developed countries. This paper conducts a systematic literature review of the theories and practices of carbon financial accounting. It makes contributions to the academic community by highlighting several key topics and research avenues that may impact the theory and practice related to carbon financial accounting and climate change. Keywords: carbon financial accounting, systematic literature review, carbon emission allowance, climate change. DOI: https://doi.org/10.55463/hkjss.issn.1021-3619.60.91