Evolutionary game theoretic analysis of low carbon investment in supply chains under governmental subsidies

Abstract

With the rapid development of global industry and economy, excessive carbon dioxide emission has emerged as a critical issue in both developed and developing countries. Using an evolutionary game framework in which game players can adjust their strategies constantly, this paper investigates how to optimize the strategy of low carbon investment for suppliers and manufacturers in supply chains, and discuss the impacts of various factors on evolutionarily stable strategies. Additionally, we examine an incentive mechanism based on governmental subsidies to eliminate free riding and motivate co-investment. Furthermore, a case study and numerical examples are provided for illustration and simulation purposes, leading to several countermeasures and suggestions. Our analytical results show that the strategic choice of low carbon investment is correlated with profit growth coefficients, investment costs and profits from free riding. Investment costs have more significant impacts than other factors on evolutionarily stable strategies, while profit growth coefficients are more important at initial stages in the evolutionary process. The incentive mechanism based on governmental subsidies is an effective solution to motivate co-investment, and governments should take some measures to improve the assess accuracy and supervisory efficiency of investment strategy.