In order to achieve the temperature goals of the Paris Agreement, the world must reach net‐zero carbon emissions around mid‐century, which calls for an entirely new energy system. Carbon pricing, in the shape of taxes or emissions trading schemes, is often seen as the main, or only, necessary climate policy instrument, based on theoretical expectations that this would promote innovation and diffusion of the new technologies necessary for full decarbonization. Here, we review the empirical knowledge available in academic ex‐post analyses of the effectiveness of existing, comparatively high‐price carbon pricing schemes in the European Union, New Zealand, British Columbia, and the Nordic countries. Some articles find short‐term operational effects, especially fuel switching in existing assets, but no article finds mentionable effects on technological change. Critically, all articles examining the effects on zero‐carbon investment found that existing carbon pricing scheme have had no effect at all. We conclude that the effectiveness of carbon pricing in stimulating innovation and zero‐carbon investment remains a theoretical argument. So far, there is no empirical evidence of its effectiveness in promoting the technological change necessary for full decarbonization.

中文翻译：

---

碳定价对完全能源脱碳技术变革的影响：事后经验证据回顾

为了实现《巴黎协定》的温度目标，世界必须在本世纪中叶之前实现碳净排放为零，这要求建立一个全新的能源系统。基于税收或排放权交易计划形式的碳定价，通常被视为主要的或唯一的必要气候政策工具，基于理论上的期望，即这将促进完全脱碳所需的新技术的创新和推广。在这里，我们回顾了对欧盟，新西兰，不列颠哥伦比亚省和北欧国家中现有的，相对较高价格的碳定价计划的有效性进行的事后学术分析中可得的经验知识。一些文章发现了短期运营影响，尤其是现有资产的燃料转换，但没有一篇文章发现对技术变革有明显影响。至关重要的是，所有检查对零碳投资的影响的文章都发现，现有的碳定价方案根本没有影响。我们得出的结论是，碳定价在刺激创新和零碳投资方面的有效性仍然是一个理论论点。迄今为止，尚无经验证据表明其有效促进完全脱碳所需的技术变革。