Reducing Air Pollution: Are Environmental Taxes Enough to Help the EU Member States Reach Climate Neutrality by 2050?

Abstract

Recently, the European Union has officially announced that its' objective in terms of environmental policy is to achieve climate neutrality, including long-term low greenhouse gas emission, by 2050. In light of this, the current study aims to offer a new and updated perspective on the effectiveness of environmental taxes in reducing air pollution in the European Union. Firstly, cluster analysis is used to group the member states of the European Union according to characteristics that will make the research results more robust. Secondly, panel data dynamic error correction models were estimated for each cluster to assess the effect of environmental taxes (and other explanatory variables) on emissions of carbon dioxide on the one hand, and greenhouse gases in general on the other hand. The research looks at both short-run and long-run effects on air pollution. The results show a statistically significant negative long-run relationship between environment taxes and atmospheric pollutants emissions. However, this effect would happen with a certain delay and it would be short lived, which makes additional environment policy measures necessary to achieve the 2050 targets.

Repowering Industrial Combined Heat and Power Units: a Contribution to Cleaner Energy Production

“…Many existing thermal power plants (TPPs) and CHPs throughout Europe have to face their advanced age, deteriorated efficiency and the strengthening pressure to lower their carbon footprint [7,8] both due to legislation [9] and growing carbon price [10,11]. On the contrary to radical solutions such as rapid shut down of coal power plants which is associated with immense costs [12], rehabilitation and repowering of the existing units to prolong their service, increase their efficiency and decrease the pollutants emissions appears more feasible [13,14].…”

“…4) is lower. (9) where ṁ 17 is the mass flow of feed water from the degasser, ṁ toHRSG is the part of the feed water pumped to HRSG, and ṁ toHTWH 1…”

Environmental Taxation and CO₂ Emission Management

“…The findings showed that income from environmental taxes as a percentage of GDP considerably reduced ecological deficits after a certain threshold level, but not cropland balance accounts. Tibulca [6] provided a fresh look at the efficacy of environmental fees in decreasing air pollution in the European Union. Panel data dynamic error correction models were employed in the study to examine the influence of environmental taxes (and other explanatory factors) on carbon dioxide emissions on the one hand, and greenhouse gas emissions in general on the other hand.…”

“…This brings to the forefront the debate about how to attain this goal in the most effective way possible. The introduction of environmental fees is a commonly utilized approach for decreasing air pollution [6]. The argument behind environmental taxes is that pollution is a kind of market failure caused by negative externalities associated with certain activities (such as transportation) or the manufacturing process for specific commodities such as energy [6].…”

“…The introduction of environmental fees is a commonly utilized approach for decreasing air pollution [6]. The argument behind environmental taxes is that pollution is a kind of market failure caused by negative externalities associated with certain activities (such as transportation) or the manufacturing process for specific commodities such as energy [6]. External costs must be internalized by incorporating them in the price of the item or service to solve this market failure.…”