The goal of this course is to give you a solid grasp of the environmental and social impacts of, and the institutions that govern, energy use, so that you can play a more effective role in shaping future policy or business decisions. We will begin with basic scientific and technological facts regarding the major uses for and sources of energy. We will then study energy markets (including spot and futures markets), and what they are capable of accomplishing; we will also study the ways energy markets may fail.  This will lead into an overview of the role of government in influencing energy decisions. We will begin with a high-level perspective, then work with a series of case studies that examine in depth what government has accomplished in the area of energy policy, and the types of issues facing business managers in the energy industries.

Because politics is so important in the energy industries, we will encounter many situations where profit-seeking and social welfare may come into conflict. Although this is not an ethics course, it will certainly provide numerous cases that you can use to sharpen your own ethical thinking. Prerequisites:  Economic reasoning will be used throughout the course, and many readings will take an economic perspective.  We will not be doing much complicated economic analysis, but it is important that you have taken intermediate economics, have some recollection of what “market failure” means, and are willing and able to read articles that present econometric analysis of data.