隨著經濟的發展，各國的能源使用量也將隨之提高，有鑑於化石燃料之能源轉換對溫室效應的影響程度最大，在此情況下，如何兼顧 CO2排放之減量目標與避免國家整體經濟受到重創，將成為各國政府制定減量措施之焦點課題與重要關鍵。基此，本文結合橫跨 70個國家在 1973 至 2007 年間之資料，依歷史地緣將樣本國家區分為歐盟地區15國、東南國亞地區 14 國、美洲地區 17 國、中東及非洲地區 22 國；另將參與碳排放交易國家依是否受京都議定書轄定分為歐盟強制性碳交易市場 15 國及國際性自願性交易市場 7 國，來探討經濟發展與碳排放量之關係。 現今全球大部分國家仍處於工業密集之階段，根據本研究實證結果亦顯示，化石能源消費量及工業佔 GDP比例之迴歸估計係數均為正相關且顯著，其中，東南亞地區及美洲地區符合 EKC倒 U型曲線，即 CO2排放量隨著經濟發展之提升而獲得改善；國際自願性碳交易市場亦符合 EKC 之倒 U 型曲線，表示在資源配置全球化背景下，透過金融交易方式來達到 CO2減排之成效獲得彰顯；歐盟地區出現 EKC之N型曲線，但因三次方之估計值很小，亦可視為 EKC之倒 U型曲線，此說明了在現實環境中，經濟發展與環境污染之間的負向關係需透過政策響應來實現。 Along with the economic development, world primary energy consumption will also be increased. Since greenhouse gas emissions are mostly in the form of carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas, how to take both the economic growth and carbon dioxide emissions reduction targets into account will be the public authorities’ tasks. Therefore, this paper will discuss the relationship between economic development and carbon dioxide emissions by applying 70 countries from 1973 to 2007. In our empirical work, we divided data based on historical and geopolitical factors into the five areas, such as European Union (EU), Southeast Asia, America and the Middle East and Africa. Furthermore, we investigated the case that countries participate in emission trading by separating countries into regular market or voluntary market. Most countries in the word are in the industrial-intensive stage. According to our empirical results, it also shows that the coefficients of fossil energy consumption and proportion of industrial added value accounted for GDP are positively significant. From the empirical results form European Union, Southeast Asia and the Americas areas, CO2 emissions increase will be improved through economic growth, that is we find the evidence to support the inverted-U shape EKC. Results for international voluntary market is also in line with the inverted-U shape EKC, that means the effectiveness of CO2 emissions reduction will be achieved through financial transactions. As to the results for regular market, EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS) supports the N-shape EKC, indicating that the negative relationship between economic growth and environmental pollution.
