ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Atmosphere and Climate
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fenvs.2025.1590813
Synergistic Effect of Carbon Emission Reduction from Regional Carbon Trading on Air Pollutant Emission Reduction
Provisionally accepted
Shengyi Yang*
Qiuli Yu- Shanxi Datong University, Datong, China
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This study employs the twofold difference approach and synthetic control method to evaluate the impact of carbon trading policies on air pollutant emissions. Results showed that implementing carbon trading could lead to an average reduction of 54.13 million tonnes of CO2 annually, alongside decreases of 176.1 thousand tonnes of SO2 and 112.5 thousand tonnes of NOx. Among the six pilot regions—Hubei, Guangdong, Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, and Chongqing—Hubei exhibited the most significant CO2 reduction, approximately 66.25 million tonnes. Hubei and Beijing also showed notable synergistic effects for SO2 reduction. The synergistic emission reduction effect of NOx was more evident in Chongqing, Shanghai, and Hubei. These findings highlighted the effectiveness of carbon trading in mitigating CO2 and related air pollutants. To enhance and optimize the carbon trading market, the study recommends increasing the clean energy share in the energy mix, improving market management systems, enforcing reasonable penalties for defaults, and developing tailored carbon trading mechanisms for different industries.
Keywords: Regional carbon trading, Carbon emission reduction, Synergistic emission reduction, Synthetic control method, Double difference method
Received: 10 Mar 2025; Accepted: 09 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Yang and Yu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Shengyi Yang, Shanxi Datong University, Datong, China
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