"GREEN ECONOMICS

A green economy is a economy or economic development model based on sustainable development and a knowledge of ecological economics.
Karl Burkart defines a green economy as based on six main sectors:^[1]

• Renewable energy (solar, wind, geothermal, marine including wave, biogas, and fuel cell)
• Green buildings (green retrofits for energy and water efficiency, residential and commercial assessment; green products and materials, and LEED construction)
• Clean transportation (alternative fuels, public transit, hybrid and electric vehicles, carsharing and carpooling programs)
• Water management (Water reclamation, greywater and rainwater systems, low-water landscaping, water purification, stormwater management)
• Waste management (recycling, municipal solid waste salvage, brownfield land remediation, Superfund cleanup, sustainable packaging)
• Land management (organic agriculture, habitat conservation and restoration; urban forestry and parks, reforestation and afforestation and soil stabilization)

The Global Citizens Center, led by Kevin Danaher, defines green economy in terms of a "triple bottom line," an economy concerned with being:^[2]

(1) Environmentally sustainable, based on the belief that our biosphere is a closed system with finite resources and a limited capacity for self-regulation and self-renewal. We depend on the earth’s natural resources, and therefore we must create an economic system that respects the integrity of ecosystems and ensures the resilience of life supporting systems.

(2) Socially just, based on the belief that culture and human dignity are precious resources that, like our natural resources, require responsible stewardship to avoid their depletion. We must create a vibrant economic system that ensures all people have access to a decent standard of living and full opportunities for personal and social development.

(3) Locally rooted, based on the belief that an authentic connection to place is the essential pre-condition to sustainability and justice. The Green Economy is a global aggregate of individual communities meeting the needs of its citizens through the responsible, local production and exchange of goods and services.

In the midst of the global economic crisis, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) called for a global Green New Deal according to which governments were encouraged to support its economic transformation to a greener economy.^[3]
Green economy includes green energy generation based on renewable energy to substitute for fossil fuels and energy conservation for efficient energy use. The green economy is considered being able to both create green jobs, ensure real, sustainable economic growth, and prevent environmental pollution, global warming, resource depletion, and environmental degradation.
Because the market failure related to environmental and climate protection as a result of external costs, high future commercial rates and associated high initial costs for research, development, and marketing of green energy sources and green products prevents firms from being voluntarily interested in reducing environment-unfriendly activities (Reinhardt, 1999; King and Lenox, 2002; Wagner, 203; Wagner, et al., 2005), the green economy is considered needing government subsidies as market incentives to motivate firms to invest and produce green products and services. The German Renewable Energy Act, legislations of many other EU countries and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, all provide such market incentives.
However, there are still incompatibilities between the UN global green new deal call and the existing international trade mechanism in terms of market incentives. For example, the WTO Subsidies Agreement has strict rules against government subsidies, especially for exported goods. Such incompatibilities may serve as obstacles to governments' responses to the UN Global green new deal call. WTO needs to update its subsidy rules to account for the needs of accelerating the transition to the green, low-carbon economy. Research is urgently needed to inform the governments and the international community how the governments should promote the green economy within their national borders without being engaged in trade wars in the name of the green economy and how they should cooperate in their promotional efforts at a coordinated international level.