The host of this year’s global climate talks, Brazil, is promoting the creation of an international climate coalition of nations that would charge domestic manufacturers for carbon emissions — and tax certain imports from countries outside the coalition.
A preliminary estimate shows that if the European Union and roughly a dozen nations charged four high-emitting sectors for their carbon pollution, it would cut the pollution by up to seven times its current trajectory and generate nearly $200 billion. The coalition would include China and India, the world’s first- and third-largest emitters, but not the United States, in second place.
The idea of a climate coalition was outlined by experts at Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in June as a way to make climate action more durable by aligning climate goals with countries’ economic interests. A coalition would offer incentives for poorer countries to join.
“There’s definitely a need to increase the ambition of the carbon pricing programs that are out there,” said Catherine Wolfram, an MIT energy and economics professor who oversaw the June report. She is on a council of economists supporting the COP30 president ahead of the November climate conference in Belem, Brazil.
