Research on global carbon abatement driven by R&D investment in the context of INDCs

Abstract

The intended nationally determined contributions were adopted as the national plans for addressing the climate change challenge after 2020, aiming at limiting global warming to 2 or 1.5 °C. In this context, energy-saving R&D has become an important way for reducing GHG emissions. This study used a climate-economy integrated assessment model to study the carbon reduction and climate mitigation effects of R&D investment by scenario simulation. The results show that most of the major carbon emitters cannot achieve their INDC targets by continuing their current R&D growth trends. Unless the R&D investment rates of countries increase to radically high levels, global warming by 2100 cannot be controlled to below 2 or 1.5 °C even when the major carbon emitters have approached or achieved their INDC targets. Low-carbon technology transfer will obviously reduce the carbon emissions of developing countries, but cannot achieve the 2 °C target. Considering the actual R&D capabilities of countries and the economic loss under excessive R&D input, raising R&D rates to approximately 4 or 5 percent and combining them with technology transfer and production damage measures will be a more realistic approach.