Abstract
One of the main climatic concerns is the increase of CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere. In the attempt and need to combat this problem, several regulatory policies have been applied in several countries by the governments, with the carbon tax being one of the most economical and effective policies in reducing CO2 emissions, thus leading to an increase in scientific research on this topic. Therefore, the main objective of this study is characterizing the existing research on the theme Carbon Tax. A sample of 121 scientific articles was collected, where several characteristics related to the content of published articles and respective authors were subsequently identified. The results obtained reveal that the number of publications has been increasing, and the themes most related to this investigation are: cap-and-trade, carbon dioxide emissions, climate change, computable general equilibrium (cge) model and emissions. Regarding the profile of researchers, the type of collective authorship is the most common and the country with the most affiliated authors is China.
TopLiterature Review
In December 1997, the signing of the Kyoto Protocol1 under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change had as its fundamental objective to encourage developed countries to limit their GHG emissions. The global plan to reduce carbon emissions began with the establishment of this Protocol, stipulating that more than 30 countries were required to reduce their major GHG emissions by at least 5.2% in the period between 2008 and 2012 compared to 1990 levels (Hu et al., 2020; Zhou et al., 2018; Yang et al., 2017).
Likewise, the implementation of the Paris Agreement2 adopted in December 2015, represented an important advance at the international level seeking to give a global and effective response to the urgent need to prevent the global average temperature from continuously rising and to act on the challenges related to climate change (APA, 2020). As a result, several developed and developing countries have committed themselves to reducing their carbon emissions.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Global Warming: Changes in the surface-air temperature, referred to as the global temperature, brought about by the greenhouse effect which is induced by emission of greenhouse gases into the air (European Environment Agency).
Carbon Tax: A carbon tax is levied on the carbon content of fossil fuels. The term can also refer to taxing other types of greenhouse gas emissions, such as methane. A carbon tax puts a price on those emissions to encourage consumers, businesses, and governments to produce less of them (Tax Foundation).
Cap-and-trade: It’s a system designed to reduce pollution in our atmosphere. The cap on greenhouse gas emissions that drive global warming is a firm limit on pollution. The cap gets stricter over time. The trade part is a market for companies to buy and sell allowances that let them emit only a certain amount, as supply and demand set the price. Trading gives companies a strong incentive to save money by cutting emissions in the most cost-effective ways (Environmental Defense Found).
Climate Changes: Climate change is a change in the statistical properties of the climate system that persists for several decades or longer—usually at least 30 years. These statistical properties include averages, variability and extremes. Climate change may be due to natural processes, such as changes in the Sun’s radiation, volcanoes or internal variability in the climate system, or due to human influences such as changes in the composition of the atmosphere or land use (Australian Academy of Science).
CO2 Emissions: Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a colourless, odourless and non-poisonous gas formed by combustion of carbon and in the respiration of living organisms and is considered a greenhouse gas. Emissions means the release of greenhouse gases and/or their precursors into the atmosphere over a specified area and period of time. Carbon dioxide emissions or CO2 emissions are emissions stemming from the burning of fossil fuels and the manufacture of cement; they include carbon dioxide produced during consumption of solid, liquid, and gas fuels as well as gas flaring (Eurostat).