Climate change is an existential threat to all of humanity. It is a truly global collective action problem, whose damages are massive, widespread, unpredictable, and inequitably distributed. How, and how fast, will we decarbonize the planet? In this course, we will investigate these questions from an economic perspective. Economic analysis of the climate problem is valuable for a number of reasons: economics provides a framework for understanding incentives for human behavior; it facilitates the evaluation of markets and policies; and it is a language to which people listen, from the highest levels of government down to the individual household.
In this course, we will use the lens of economics to clarify the challenge of climate change, understand market function in emissions-intensive industries, and evaluate the theoretical and empirical impacts of the climate policies at our disposal. We will start by reviewing some foundational economic concepts, as well as modeling and comparing the impacts of market-based and prescriptive policies. In the second unit of the course, we will zoom in on electricity, a sector with enormous greenhouse gas emissions and enormous importance for widespread decarbonization. In the third unit, we will consider several other applications of climate economics: energy efficiency, transportation, food and agriculture, water, nature-based solutions, and carbon neutrality.

While not required, it is suggested that you take EAS 570 - Environmental Economics before taking this course.