Abstract

Energy and climate policy are historically considered from a national territorial perspective. Yet, for global issues, the interconnections between countries via consumption and international trade blur national boundaries. Around one-third of energy consumption and one-quarter climate related emissions are from the production of goods and services which are consumed in a different country to where they were produced. Large variations occur at the national level, but it is generally found that rich countries are net importers of energy and emissions, while developing countries are net exporters. For traded goods and services, recent studies have shown that officially reported territorial carbon dioxide emission reductions in rich countries are more than offset by an increase in emissions in other countries due to increased imports. When additionally linking goods and services to international trade in fossil fuels, recent studies show countries are becoming more dependent on both foreign sourced energy and production. For land use change, recent work suggests that around 40% of Brazil’s deforestation can ultimately be linked to consumption outside of Brazil. While these results often have high appeal to the social sciences, most studies have been focused on quantifying traded energy and emissions and, as yet, there has been very little research initiated from the social sciences. There is a large scope to develop interdisciplinary research questions to better integrate existing and on-going research on consumption and international trade perspectives into energy and climate policy. This paper gives an overview of potential areas of interdisciplinary collaboration related to international trade and consumption, with a focus on the implications for climate polic

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