COMMENT | When I first heard about carbon leakage, I thought it had something to do with well or pipeline leaks in the oil and gas industry. But “leakage” can mean different things in climate change.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) defines carbon leakage as the increase in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions outside the countries taking domestic mitigation action divided by the reduction in the emissions of these countries.

This occurs when tighter regulations or policies force companies to move the production...