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Xuebing Wang

Thesis title: The Impacts to the International Aviation Industry by including it to the EU-ETS


Primary supervisor: Professor Paul Ekins 
Secondary supervisor: Mr Francisco Javier De Cendra 
Starting date: 24 September 2012
Projected completion date: 15 September 2016

The aim of the proposed research is to investigate what impacts can be brought by including the aviation industry in the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS). Specifically, it will examine how the carbon constraint will affect the development of the aviation industry. As the new approach includes all airlines departing from or arriving at EU airports, the research has to be done on a global perspective, so that the research will explore whether the aviation industry in different countries will be affected in different ways. It will also study what the economic impacts are in different countries because of the carbon constraints in the aviation industry.

In order to achieve these objectives, the proposed research will seek to answer the following questions:

  • How will the international aviation industry develop with carbon constraints?
  • How will the EU-ETS contribute to the development of the international aviation industry?
  • How will different ways of distributing/selling carbon emissions permits affect different countries beyond 2020?
  • How will including the aviation industry into the EU-ETS affect the operation of the EU carbon trading market?
  • Does the current trading scheme appropriately reflect the projected economic growth in different countries?
  • How might negotiations among different countries with different environment policies build an international legal basis for controlling carbon emissions from international aviation?
  • The research will utilise a range of different methods, including modelling and other quantitative analysis, and surveys of the industry.
Biography

MSc International Finance, University of Westminster, UK 01/2011-01/2012

B.A. in Finance, Hunan University, Hunan, China 09/2006 – 09/2010

Coming from a finance background, I spent the majority of my past years studying corporate finance, risk management, and financial markets. After tasting these best bits of financial knowledge, I realized that the academic research has to be related to the real world development. That is why I am always interested in the research topic of climate change and environmental economics. Driven by the interest of combining these financial theoretical skills with energy derivatives, I conducted an independent research on the project An Opportunity Analysis of Carbon Finance by Chinese Commercial Banks. The objective of the research is to investigate the opportunities that domestic banks in China should catch to develop their new business sector in carbon trade and assist local clean development mechanism projects. An operation model was draw to explain the theory of CDM, which is the basic frame of carbon trade in developing country. The valuable research experience gained from the project constitutes a good training in both independent research and critical thinking, which will positively contribute to my future education.

During my postgraduate study at University of Westminster, I gained deeper understanding on financial and economic research knowledge and skills. Actually, I was intending to develop a project about corporate environmentalism; however, I did not find an appropriate supervisor for such a thesis. Instead, I chose cross border M&A as my final project. In this paper, the event-study was used to exam the influence of the announcement of M&A to the acquirer’s stock price.

Given my interest in environmental economics, researches in related areas are of particular importance in my future development. By working in your group, I will be able to conduct a more comprehensive understanding in environmental economics. Having these experiences will allow me to be more effective in my future research.