scholarly journals Ecological Land Protection or Carbon Emission Reduction? Comparing the Value Neutrality of Mainstream Policy Responses to Climate Change

Forests ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (12) ◽  
pp. 1789
Author(s):  
Yujie Ren ◽  
Tianhui Fan

Improving the quality of forest, water, farmland, and other types of land use with outstanding ecosystem optimization, restoration functions (ecological lands) and reducing anthropogenic carbon emissions are recognized as the two main approaches of current mainstream climate change policies. The paper aims to evaluate and compare the value neutrality within these two main types of policy responses to climate change. To do that, a case study was conducted at the Yangtze River Economic Belt, China. We first summarized the implementation status of all climate change policies in the study area and collected data related to climate and economy at the policy pilot sites. Next, the coupling relationship between climate and socio-economic conditions at policy pilot sites was calculated by the Tapio model. Finally, we constructed dummy variables that reflected the status of policy implementation, to estimate the value neutrality of mainstream climate change policies and their impact on the coupling relationship by DID models. The results showed that the proportion of policies related to ecological lands that significantly improved the coupling degree between climate and socio-economic conditions of the pilot sites is more than that of carbon emission-related ones. Moreover, the average coupling degree between climate and socio-economic conditions of the pilot sites of ecological land policies was significantly increased by 3.99 units after policy implementation, which is 27.8% higher than that of carbon emission reduction policies. Generally, the two main findings directly evidenced that the climate change policies aimed at improving the area and quality of ecological lands were more conducive to the coupling development of the climate–economy nexus than the policies focusing on restricting carbon emissions, which provides important enlightenment for the establishment of relevant environmental policies around the world.

Author(s):  
Dede Long ◽  
Grant H. West ◽  
Rodolfo M. Nayga

Abstract The agriculture and food sectors contribute significantly to greenhouse gas emissions. About 15 percent of food-related carbon emissions are channeled through restaurants. Using a contingent valuation (CV) method with double-bounded dichotomous choice (DBDC) questions, this article investigates U.S. consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for an optional restaurant surcharge in support of carbon emission reduction programs. The mean estimated WTP for a surcharge is 6.05 percent of an average restaurant check, while the median WTP is 3.64 percent. Our results show that individuals have a higher WTP when the surcharge is automatically added to restaurant checks. We also find that an information nudge—a short climate change script—significantly increases WTP. Additionally, our results demonstrate that there is heterogeneity in treatment effects across consumers’ age, environmental awareness, and economic views. Our findings suggest that a surcharge program could transfer a meaningful amount of the agricultural carbon reduction burden to consumers that farmers currently shoulder.


Forests ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (10) ◽  
pp. 1294
Author(s):  
Asif Raihan ◽  
Rawshan Ara Begum ◽  
Mohd Nizam Mohd Said ◽  
Joy Jacqueline Pereira

Malaysia has a large extent of forest cover that plays a crucial role in storing biomass carbon and enhancing carbon sink (carbon sequestration) and reducing atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions, which helps to reduce the negative impacts of global climate change. This article estimates the economic value of forest carbon stock and carbon value per hectare of forested area based on the price of removing per ton CO2eq in USD from 1990 to 2050. The economic value of biomass carbon stored in the forests is estimated at nearly USD 51 billion in 2020 and approximately USD 41 billion in 2050, whereas carbon value per hectare forest area is estimated at USD 2885 in 2020 and USD 2388 in 2050. If the BAU scenario of forest loss (converting forests to other land use) continues, the projected estimation of carbon stock and its economic value might fall until 2050 unless further initiatives on proper planning of forest management and ambitious policy implementation are taken. Instead, Malaysia’s CO2 emission growth started to fall after 2010 due to rising forest carbon sink of 282 million tons between 2011 and 2016, indicating a huge potential of Malaysian forests for future climate change mitigation. The estimated and projected value of carbon stock in Malaysian forest biomass, annual growth of forest carbon, forest carbon density and carbon sink would be useful for the better understanding of enhancing carbon sink by avoiding deforestation, sustainable forest management, forest conservation and protection, accurate reporting of national carbon inventories and policy-making decisions. The findings of this study could also be useful in meeting emission reduction targets and policy implementation related to climate change mitigation in Malaysia.


2012 ◽  
Vol 524-527 ◽  
pp. 2549-2552
Author(s):  
Xiao Jing Li

The United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen brought us the attention to "low-carbon, energy saving". For economic sustainable economic development, energy conservation and environmental protection must be an important strategic move. Sports as a healthy way of life should respond positively to low-carbon energy fitness concept, promote energy-saving environmental protection under the fitness movement, advocate scientific fitness, and create a rich atmosphere in the sports and fitness aspects of environmental protection. Sports should make a meaningful contribution to energy conservation, carbon emission reduction and environment protection.


Energies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (22) ◽  
pp. 6128
Author(s):  
Wen-Hsien Tsai

The Paris Agreement was signed by 195 nations in December 2015 to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change following the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) and the 1997 Kyoto Protocol [...]


2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 99
Author(s):  
Yong Adilah Shamsul Harumain ◽  
Nur Farhana Azmi ◽  
Suhaini Yusoff

Transit stations are generally well known as nodes of spaces where percentage of people walking are relatively high. The issue is do more planning is actually given to create walkability. Creating walking led transit stations involves planning of walking distance, providing facilities like pathways, toilets, seating and lighting. On the other hand, creating walking led transit station for women uncover a new epitome. Walking becomes one of the most important forms of mobility for women in developing countries nowadays. Encouraging women to use public transportation is not just about another effort to promote the use of public transportation but also another great endeavour to reduce numbers of traffic on the road. This also means, creating an effort to control accidents rate, reducing carbon emission, improving health and eventually, developing the quality of life. Hence, in this paper, we sought first to find out the factors that motivate women to walk at transit stations in Malaysia. A questionnaire survey with 562 female user of Light Railway Transit (LRT) was conducted at LRT stations along Kelana Jaya Line. Both built and non-built environment characteristics, particularly distance, safety and facilities were found as factors that are consistently associated with women walkability. With these findings, the paper highlights the criteria  which are needed to create and make betterment of transit stations not just for women but also for walkability in general.


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