Currently, developing countries do not have any mandatory obligations to reduce their GHG emissions. However, without their participation, it is unlikely that global GHG concentrations can be limited to the level required to avert climate change.
The main concern of the developing countries is that any binding obligations to cut their GHG emissions would be costly in terms of their economic development, but it may be possible to substantially reduce developing countries’ GHG emissions without curtailing their expected economic growth because these countries possess a large number low-cost GHG mitigation options.
Such a low carbon economic development would produce a win-win situation where the economic growth of developing countries is maintained, or even enhanced, and GHG emissions are also reduced. However, there is a complete lack of knowledge on the extent to which a developing country could pursue a low carbon growth strategy, in other words, how much a developing country could reduce its GHG emissions without sacrificing its economic growth.
Our research aims to investigate GHG mitigation options that do not curtail expected economic growth in developing countries and their distributional consequences (e.g., income inequality and poverty).