文档介绍：Part III: The Economics of Stabilisation
Annex 7A Climate Change and the Environmental s Curve
Some evidence indicates that, for local pollutants like oxides of nitrogen, sulphur dioxide and
heavy metals, there is an inverted-U shaped relationship between e per head and
emissions per head: the so-called ‘environmental s curve’, illustrated in Figure . The
usual rationale for such a curve is that the demand for environmental improvements is e
elastic, although explanations based on structural changes in the economy have also been put
forward. So the question arises, is there such a relationship for CO2? If so, economic
development would ultimately lead to falls in global emissions (although that would be highly
unlikely before GHG concentrations had risen to destructive levels).
Figure ’A hypothetical environmental s curve’
Emissions or
concentrations
per head
Y* e per
head
In the case of greenhouse gases, this argument is not very convincing. As societies e
richer, they may want to improve their own environment, but they can do little about climate
change by reducing their own CO2 emissions alone. With CO2, the global nature of the externality
means that people in any particular high-e country cannot by themselves significantly affect
global emissions and hence their own climate. This contrasts with the situa