China's manufacturing firms' willingness to pay for carbon abatement: A cost perspective

The existing studies of emissions reduction focus mainly on the technical potential and abatement costs while overlooking firms' willingness to pay (WTP) for emissions reduction. Yet WTP is a key parameter in a firm's decision to carry out emissions reduction while maximizing its profits. This paper estimates China's manufacturing industry (CMI) firms' maximum WTP for carbon abatement-defined as the cumulative product between the marginal abatement cost and corresponding abatement potential-using a large sample from a data envelopment analysis model. The results show that (a) the maximum WTP is significantly constrained by an isocost carbon abatement curve at RMB 8.65 million for the representative CMI firm; (b) the representative firms' WTP for carbon abatement varies among the sub-sectors; and (c) profitability and production scales both positively affect firms' WTP for carbon abatement in all of CMI sub-sectors, while innovation investment has a negative effect. The results suggest that the cost of carbon reduction technology for CMI firms should be below RMB 8.65 million for a representative CMI firm. The government should formulate subsidies or tax relief policies to help firms reduce their abatement costs. Further, the division of tasks in different sub-sectors, between carbon emissions reduction on the one hand, and ongoing innovation on the other, should be clearly distinguished by policy bias to promote the transformation of industrial structure.