Diversification and Cooperation Strategies in a Decarbonizing World

Fossil fuel importers can apply various climate and trade taxes to encourage fossil fuel-dependent countries to cooperate on climate mitigation, and fossil fuel-dependent countries can respond with alternative diversification and cooperation strategies. This paper runs macroeconomic model simulation...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Peszko, Grzegorz
Other Authors: Golub, Alexander, van der Mensbrugghe, Dominique
Format: eBook
Language:English
Published: Washington, D.C The World Bank 2020
Series:World Bank E-Library Archive
Online Access:
Collection: World Bank E-Library Archive - Collection details see MPG.ReNa
Description
Summary:Fossil fuel importers can apply various climate and trade taxes to encourage fossil fuel-dependent countries to cooperate on climate mitigation, and fossil fuel-dependent countries can respond with alternative diversification and cooperation strategies. This paper runs macroeconomic model simulations of alternative strategies that the global community and fossil fuel-dependent countries can pursue to encourage and enable their participation in a global low-carbon transition. The following are the findings from the simulations. (i) Fuel importers' unilateral carbon taxes capture fossil fuel-dependent countries' resource rents and accelerate their emission-intensive diversification. (ii) Border taxes on the carbon content of imports from fossil fuel-dependent countries do not induce comprehensive cooperation, but broader trade sanctions do. (iii) Cooperative wellhead carbon taxes can achieve cooperation without trade wars. (iv) Lower-income fossil fuel-dependent countries with large untapped reserves need additional incentives and enablers to cooperate and diversify into low-carbon assets. (v) Incentives to cooperate are misaligned between different fossil fuel-dependent countries and between owners of different fuels. (vi) The strategies that maximize consumption and growth in fossil fuel-dependent countries reduce the value of assets in extractive and heavy industries. (vii) Asset diversification is a robust, long-term strategy but faces the tragedy of the horizon
Physical Description:36 pages