Abstract
ABSTRACTChina is now in the process of building its national carbon emissions trading scheme (ETS). Data are the foundation for the design and operation of an ETS. This paper presents a comparative analysis of the data requirements for China’s national ETS construction and the existing ETS-related data for enterprises in China. In doing so, it identifies the underlying data gap in building China’s national ETS in terms of data availability and data quality. Based on the experiences of international ETSs, and experiences at national and pilot levels in China, we propose two short-term strategies and four long-term solutions to meet the challenges from technical and management perspectives.Key policy insightsThe major data requirements for China’s national ETS can be categorized into six groups: production, emissions, technology, management, economy and policy data.The ETS-related data are generally available in China except for parts of data on emissions, such as energy carbon content and the oxidation factor.The data challenges that are faced by China’s national ETS include differences in corporate data availability and imperfect data quality.Short-term strategies to address the challenges include establishing data collection guidelines based on existing data and prioritizing major emissions or sectors with better data for inclusion under the ETS.Long-term solutions to address the challenges include introducing the concept of tiers, clarifying data sources and introducing a monitoring plan, conducting MRV capacity building and establishing a rigorous third-party verification system.
Highlights
As a market-based instrument for controlling carbon emissions, emissions trading schemes (ETS) are attracting attention in an increasing number of jurisdictions (World Bank, 2016)
We investigated the proportion of enterprises with different monitoring frequencies and the proportion of enterprises that had external certification involving data quality control measures, including relevant standards, such as ISO10012 (International Standardization Organization [ISO], 2003), and ISO14001 (ISO, 2015), ISO50001 (ISO, 2011) and laboratory qualifications that are certified by the national or provincial industry associations in China
To meet the data-related challenges mentioned in section 5, we propose short-term strategies and long-term solutions based on our analysis of existing data along with the experiences of international ETSs and at the national and pilot levels in China
Summary
As a market-based instrument for controlling carbon emissions, emissions trading schemes (ETS) are attracting attention in an increasing number of jurisdictions (World Bank, 2016). Studies of data issues regarding China’s ETSs have mainly focused on optimizing MRV mechanisms for carbon emissions data and improving data completeness and quality (Chen, Chen, Bao, & Zhang, 2014; Falconer et al, 2013; Zheng, Liu, & Wang, 2015). These studies lack systematic analyses of the data requirements for the design and operation of China’s national ETS or the challenges that are faced, for example, the data required during the design and operation of the scheme, the data’s availability and quality, and gaps in this regard. By drawing on the experiences of international ETSs and experiences at the national and pilot levels in China, the article describes solutions to cope with the challenges and ensure the availability and quality of relevant data for China’s national ETS
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