The demographic changes of East Asian countries have accelerated in recent years. With consideration of the linkage between human behavior and carbon emissions, it is necessary to consider demographic characteristics for the CO₂ emission projections of these countries. This study examines how changes in the demographic structure affect the emission projections of three East Asian countries (South Korea, China, and Japan) by comparing two different vintages of population projections. The study constructed a dynamic computable general equilibrium (CGE) model and applied the most up-to-date dataset of population prospects, GTAP 10, and the labor force participation rate. By comparing UN2010 and UN2019 projections, the study examined the impact of demographic changes on CO₂ emission profiles of the three East Asian countries. The simulation result showed that GDP, which represents economic activity along with the population, is the direct channel of CO₂ emission projections. Moreover, the scenario analysis suggested the population factor as one of the main drivers of the CO₂ emission projection and a clear positive relationship between GDP and CO₂ emissions, though CO₂ emissions are generally inelastic in response to a GDP decrease in the three East Asian countries. The finding indirectly implies that not only the size of the population but also demographic composition should be considered to project CO₂ emissions, as the labor participation rate is an important factor to determine the production function.

The Seoul Eco-mileage Program is a representative project of the One Less Nuclear Power Plant (OLNPP) scheme, which addresses the energy transition policy of Seoul aiming to reduce CO₂ emissions. Unlike other governmental projects, the success of this program requires the direct participation of citizens. This study investigates the influence of civic engagement in participant towns (Level 1: 423 administrative towns) and districts (Level 2: 25 administrative districts) on CO₂ emissions reduction (kg CO₂/membership) throughout 2017 in Seoul via multilevel modeling. Our results show that town-level civic engagement, as measured by voter turnout, is positively correlated with the performance of the Eco-mileage Program. Moreover, when civic engagement factors (social trust, volunteer activities, and citizen participation) at Level 1 interact with Level 2 factors (housing prices, motivation of district leaders, and energy-saving practices) in each district, we observed cross-level interactive effects on CO₂ reduction. Among Level 2 factors, the representative institutional capacities, such as financial independence and ordinance, showed positive correlations with the performance efficacy of the energy transition policy of Seoul.

In April 2023, the Korean government announced its national emission pathways to achieve its 2030 NDC target of reducing GHG emissions by 40% compared to the 2018-level. The study provides an overview of the economic impacts of achieving the NDC target on the Korean economy, and particularly, it considers the different circumstances of the global mitigation efforts. The study collects the countries’ NDC target information, applies a global dynamic recursive CGE model with GTAP 11 database, and establishes seven scenarios with different global mitigation efforts and the recycling of carbon revenues. Three types of international cooperation scenarios are Global Cooperation, Partial cooperation without Korea, and Unilateral Commitment by Korea. The utilization of carbon revenues is another dimension of the scenarios. The result indicates that all regions experience negative impacts on real GDP under the Global Cooperation scenario with lump-sum tax transfer approach. With the labor tax recycling, the losses in real GDP decrease, and some regions, including Korea, show some positive economic impacts. Particularly, Korea experiences substantial benefits from double dividend. Moreover, Korea experiences relatively favorable impacts of carbon pricing on real GDI. In addition, all scenarios indicate some decrease in real exports and imports in all regions, and the result suggests that carbon pricing would lead to significant negative impacts on production, particularly of fossil fuel sectors. We also conduct a sensitivity analysis on key parameters, such as the elasticities of substitution between energy and genuine input factors, as well as those between different sources of energies.