The path to global climate justice: From the perspective of regional discrepancy in embodied carbon emissions

Achieving climate justice is an important goal and basic principle of global climate governance. This paper evaluates the progress of achieving global climate justice by quantitatively depicting the evolution characteristics, group differences and driving factors of global embodied carbon emissions. The results indicate that the phenomenon of embodied carbon inequality is more obvious. Furthermore, a data-driven clustering algorithm is adopted to divide the world's major economies into four convergence clubs based on the embodied carbon emissions levels. We find that the embodied carbon emissions gap between different clubs has widened since 2008, which may be related to the re-industrialization of developed countries. The results of SDA analysis indicate that the embodied carbon emissions of developed countries, such as the United States, are more driven by per capita end-use. On the contrary, unclean consumption and investment structure is the main driving force for the increase of embodied carbon emissions in developing countries such as China. Therefore, efforts should be made in developing countries on the clean adjustment of consumption and investment structure to promote the convergence of embodied carbon emissions with developed countries. •Phenomenon of global embodied carbon inequality is more obvious.•Driving factors of global embodied carbon inequality is examined.•Embodied carbon emissions gap between different clubs has widened since 2008.•Clean adjustment of consumption and investment structure should be emphasized.