Managing the mitigation: Analysis of the effectiveness of target-based policies on China's provincial carbon emission and transfer

Abstract

As the world's largest carbon emitter, China has set stringent mitigation targets. The Five-Year-Plans have been an important administrative tool for China in climate change mitigation. However, the emissions transfer inside China has raised the problem of pollution haven affect and challenges to the effectiveness of the mitigation policies. This study examines whether mitigation policies can promote emissions reduction and whether it causes the pollution haven effect in China. It establishes an Extended Provincial Input-Output Model to calculate province production-based emissions, consumption-based emissions, and emissions transfer from 2005 to 2015. The results show that: (1) The mitigation policy is effective as a 1% increase of the completeness of the mitigation target is related to a 0.118% decrease of production-based emissions. (2) Stringent mitigation policies increase net emissions outflow as a 1% increase of the completeness of the target is related to an 18.5% increase of the net emissions transfer. (3) Subsequent policy enforcement will weaken once the mitigation goal is accomplished. This study reputes that the mitigation policy effectively controls emissions, especially production-based emissions, while it still needs refined policy designing considering the pollution haven effect inside China. • Mitigation policies reduce production-based emissions. • More stringent policies increase the net emissions outflow of a province. • Policy enforcement will weaken once the mitigation goal has been accomplished. • Refined designing is needed for consumption-based emissions and carbon transfer.