Carbon finance and carbon market in China: Progress and challenges

Climate change has become one of the major challenges that humans have faced in recent years. As an economic measure to cope with climate change, carbon finance has drawn considerable attention in recent years, since it can promote low-cost emission reductions. As the largest developing country with rich carbon emission resources, China plays an important role in establishing a sound carbon trading market. This study presents a systematic review of the research and development progress and challenges of China's carbon finance and carbon market. Based on the brief introduction of some related concepts and background, this study mainly discusses the role of China's financial institutions in carbon finance, and the development of China's carbon market. Particularly, it focuses on the recent practices and the carbon trading pilots established in China. In addition, the major challenges for China to establish a national unified carbon market were pointed out, in terms of awareness, relevant professionals, sound legal systems and carbon financial product innovation. Finally, we put forward the policy implications for the future development of carbon finance and carbon market, which provides important decision support for establishing a unified global carbon market. (C) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.