Multi-agent-based Simulation for Policy Evaluation of Carbon Emissions

To effectively control air pollution, China has established regional carbon emissions trading markets based on cap and trade in seven pilot provinces and cities. Government agencies that manage the market want to know that whether the policies of carbon emissions are effective and appropriate. Under cap and trade, the emissions trading system, made up of the government, emissions exchange and participating enterprises, is nonlinear, dynamic, uncertain, and decision-decentralized. Also, there exist interactive influences among participants and multiple decision objectives in the emissions trading system. So, this research applied a multi-agent modeling and simulation approach to build such a simulation model for the regional emissions trading system, and then analyzed the policies related to total emissions control, emission quotas allocation, emission quotas auction, and excessive emission fines.