Climate change and externality. Empirical evidences from the EKC of CO₂ and PM₁₀

It is widely acknowledged that climate change is a global problem which needs to be treated seriously. Externality is an important part in the field of theoretical research of climate change. However, how much does the externality really matter in climate change? There are almost no intuitive feelings from empirical evidences, and this paper is aimed at revealing the externality through empirical research tentatively. The empirical studies have been made based on the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) of CO₂ and PM₁₀ in this paper. The results illustrate that: 1) Compared with the regional air pollutants PM₁₀, the global atmospheric pollutants CO₂ has more significant externality. That is the main reason why people from different countries have more appeal but less action on the issue of carbon-emission reduction. 2) With the growth of the per capita income, PM₁₀ seems to be better controlled, but CO₂ shows no signs of descending. It is unlikely that carbon emission and global warming will be under better control with the development of the economy, unless externality problem can be addressed properly through international cooperation.