Evaluating China’s pilot carbon Emission Trading Scheme: collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants

Collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants can more efficiently achieve green technological change, industrial low-carbon transition, and high-quality economic and social development. As a typical environmental policy in China, the pilot carbon Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) has obvious advantages in achieving the collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants. Therefore, an evaluation of China’s pilot carbon ETS from the perspective of collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants is performed in this paper. Compared with previous studies, first, this study innovatively uses the coupled coordination degree (CCD) model to measure the collaborative reduction level of carbon and air pollutants under different scenarios based on the panel data of China’s 30 provincial-level regions during 2004–2018. Second, this study uses the DID method to evaluate the impact of China’s pilot carbon ETS on the collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants and conducts some robustness checks and regional heterogeneity regressions. Third, this study uses the synthetic control method (SCM) further to examine the policy outcomes of the pilot carbon ETS. Scenario analysis shows that attaching importance to reducing air pollution will improve the collaborative reduction effect of carbon and air pollutants. Furthermore, the implementation of China’s pilot carbon ETS exerts an effect of roughly 24.7% on reducing carbon, roughly 10.1% on reducing air pollutants, and roughly 22.0% on the collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants, ceteris paribus. Regional heterogeneity analysis shows that the impacts of the pilot carbon ETS are significant in all regions, except that the impact on reducing air pollutants in the central region is not significant. In addition, results from SCM indicate that the impacts of the pilot carbon ETS on the collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants are significantly efficient in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Hubei, and Chongqing, while not much efficient in Guangdong and Fujian. The main policy implications include strengthening the top-level design of the ETS in the collaborative reduction of carbon and air pollutants, attaching importance to the governance of air pollution, making the regional governance more targeted, and improving energy efficiency.