Carbon Footprints

Is a country’s contribution to global climate change measurable in changes in its CO2 emissions, as is implicitly assumed in the Kyoto agreement? Or, because of the importance of international goods trade, is a carbon footprint that captures all CO2 emissions that arise in the wake of a country’s absorption (i.e. consumption and investment) a better measurement? The authors have created a database with the footprints of 40 countries for the period 1995–2007. The descriptive analysis of these data shows that the CO2 emissions of a country and its footprint can differ, both in terms of levels and in their dynamics. To prevent the shifting of emissions abroad (“carbon leakage”), future climate agreements should be directed at the carbon footprint rather than the domestic emissions of countries.