Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Continental Approach To Climate Change: An Analysis Of The European Union’S Emissions Trading System, Jacob P. Wellman

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

The European Union’s Emissions Trading System (ETS) stands as a model for managing a changing climate in a complicated international environment. As it enters its Phase III period of auctioning emissions permits, an understanding of players and their performance is essential to evaluating the success of the emissions market. Concerns that wealthy countries will purchase permits, rather than reduce their real emissions, have led to skepticism about the system’s potential for success. In this study, I examine ambition exhibited by countries in using less than maximum allowable levels of offsets to achieve Phase II reduction requirements. Using fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative …