Abstract:
On the issue of national legislation on climate change, there are two options in China, namely the "Law on Responding to Climate Change" and the "Law on Carbon Peak and Carbon Neutrality". Based on China's actual situations and foreign experience, the Law on Carbon Peak and Carbon Neutrality, which can better achieve the goals of carbon emission reduction, green and low-carbon development and the value rationality of just transition, is a more necessary and feasible choice. It shall be legislatively designated as the Carbon Neutrality Implementation Act, with this title constituting its statutory nomenclature. The Carbon Neutrality Implementation Act embodies pluralistic legislative regulatory features: the hierarchical objectives of direct, indirect and long-term goals, presence of the multiple functions of specialised regulation, synergistic regulation and accountability regulation, and the normative expressions of different effects determined by the regulatory content. In constructing the institutional system of the Carbon Neutrality Implementation Act, it is imperative to transform its legislative regulatory features into legislative expressions within the legal system. This involves formulating the specialised legal regime that is goal-orientated, encompasses process control and evaluation of results, and ensures fair transition safeguards, the hybrid legal regime for project-based carbon evaluation, the realisation of the value of ecological products from carbon sinks, and safeguarding funds for the green and low-carbon transition, as well as the consequence-based accountability regime.