Cooperation and emissions price harmonisation without linking: prospects for ‘climate teams’ in East Asia

This is Suzi Kerr's presentation to the Harvard Centre in Shanghai on how 'climate teams' could work. You can find more information on climate teams here. More about the conference is available here.

Three countries in East Asia (People’s Republic of China, Japan, Republic of Korea) together accounted for approximately 28% of global greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions in 2013.1 In addition, GHG emissions are increasing rapidly in the region. In order to address global climate change effectively, it is crucial that the countries of East Asia (as well, of course, as other large global emitters) design and implement effective climate-change policies – and work together in doing so. International cooperation can, if well designed and executed, increase policy effectiveness and reduce mitigation costs, hence allowing for increased mitigation ambition.

This workshop will examine the status of climate change policy in the countries of East Asia and of international cooperation to address climate change. Participants will also explore options for increased cooperation in the future. Attendees will consider potential linkage among emissions-trading systems – and among heterogeneous policy systems – as one possible form of international cooperation, and how the Paris Agreement – including Article 6 – might facilitate such cooperation in the region. Participants will then examine various non-market approaches to international cooperation.

Participants include social scientists (economists, political scientists) and legal scholars who have studied climate-change policy – as well as policy practitioners. Attendees are based in Japan, New Zealand, People’s Republic of China, Republic of Korea, Republic of Singapore, and the United States.