2014

What Can Universities Do About Climate Change?

October 20, 2014

[Robert Stavins' blog] There has been considerable debate about whether universities – and, for that matter, foundations – should divest fossil-fuel stocks from their investment portfolios as a way to reduce the risk of global climate change. My own institution, Harvard University, decided that such an action was neither warranted nor wise (a position that I have supported in a post at this blog, as well as in...

Peru Minister: US Might Make "Significant" Donation to Climate Fund

October 10, 2014

[The Hill ]...After President Obama's speech at the U.N. Climate Summit in New York last month revealed no intentions to contribute to the fund, experts close to negotiations said the road to Paris looked less certain.

“If you ask me what could happen that could blow everything up and cause the Paris talks to collapse,” Robert Stavins, professor for Harvard University's environmental economics program, told The Hill last month. “It’s the $100 billion commitment that is now on the table.”

Viewpoints: Climate Change Policy Comes with Economic Risks

October 5, 2014

[The Sacramento Bee ]...California represents less than 1 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Any solution that does not involve a global consensus will cause California to suffer very high costs without any benefits. With this in mind, noted environmental economists Todd Schatzki and Robert Stavins have outlined a possible next generation climate change framework. This approach would balance the goals of global leadership...

HEEP Welcomes New Fellows

September 30, 2014

The Harvard Environmental Economics Program (HEEP) is very pleased to welcome a number of new Faculty and Pre-Doctoral Fellows. Our Faculty Fellows are actively engaged in research at the frontiers of environmental, energy, and natural resource economics and have made key breakthroughs that are relevant to public policy. They have held important positions in the President’s Council of Economic Advisors, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the World Bank, the World Health Organization, and the Intergovernmental Panel on...

The UN Climate Summit and a Key Issue for the 2015 Paris Agreement

September 27, 2014

[Robert Stavins' blog] World leaders converged at the United Nations in New York City this past week for Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s much anticipated Climate Summit, a lead-up to global negotiations that will take place in Lima, Peru, in December of this year, and culminate a year later in Paris. The challenge before negotiators is great, because there are significant obstacles to reaching a meaningful...

Slowing Climate Change May Boil Down To Cost And Competition

September 23, 2014

[WGBH News ]...Gabriel Chan, 27, is a Ph.D student at Harvard in public policy, focusing on climate change and energy technology. But his daily efforts to cut his carbon footprint aren’t always inspired by his research.

“Recently, I changed my light bulbs to LED light bulbs.," Chan explained. "And that’s because my energy company sent me a letter that said I was way worse than all my neighbors. They gave me a little graph and said you’re doing badly. So, we switched all our light bulbs and this was the first...

Climate Realities

September 20, 2014

[The New York Times ] Robert N. Stavins: On Tuesday, world leaders will converge at United Nations headquarters in New York for a summit meeting on the climate that will set the stage for global negotiations next year to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the threat of global climate change. The summit is titled “Catalyzing Action,” a decidedly hopeful characterization.

Changgi Lee (MPA/ID 2015) Interns at the World Bank

September 18, 2014

Changgi Lee, a Master in Public Administration/International Development student at the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) spent summer 2014 interning at the World Bank. While there, he wrote an article on “Green and Sustainable Transport” and also developed a proposal-evaluation process for the Korea Green Growth Partnership. Within the World Bank, he worked under both the Transport Anchor and the Korea Green Growth Partnership Secretariat. Before coming to HKS to study international development, Lee worked in the Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime affairs in South Korea for five years....

China, the Climate and the Fate of the Planet

September 15, 2014

[Rolling Stone ]...The second factor is that until now, the biggest obstacle to an international agreement to reduce carbon pollution has been the United States. But that's starting to change. Thanks to Obama's recent crackdown on pollution, as well as the boom in cheap natural gas, which has displaced dirty coal, carbon emissions in the U.S. are on the decline. "What the president has done is very important," says Robert Stavins, director of the Harvard Project on Climate Agreements. "It allows the U.S. to...

Why a Tax on Carbon Can Help Climate Change - and The Economy

September 8, 2014

[Forbes ]...A carbon tax, essentially a “tax on pollution,” has long been regarded as a potentially effective means of reducing the emission of greenhouse gases, but the concern about it has been its negative economic impact. Jorgenson contends, as described below, that needn’t be the case.