The Impact of Financing Structures on the Cost of CO2 Transport
Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a promising decarbonization technology. However, deployment of CCS hinges on the availability of CO2 transport, necessitating policymakers to assess how the financing of CO2 transport infrastructure will be realized. By studying the impact of financing structures on the total cost of CO2 transport, a new CEEPR Working Paper explores this topic further.
Climate Policy Reform Options in 2025
With the expiration of many tax cuts and unmet climate targets, 2025 could be a crucial year for climate policy in the United States. Using an integrated model of energy supply and demand, a new Working Paper aims to assess climate policies that the U.S. federal government may consider in 2025 and to evaluate emissions reductions, abatement costs, fiscal impacts, and household energy expenditures across a range of policy scenarios.
Bidding in Uniform Price Auctions for Value Maximizing Buyers
A new Working Paper studies the problem of bidding in uniform price auctions, a widely used format in Treasury auctions, emissions permit auctions, and energy markets. Although uniform price auctions are non-truthful for bidders with quasilinear utility functions, several empirical findings suggest that this auction format induces truthful bidding from the bidders.
Commentary: Understanding the Price Cap on Russian Oil
The price cap on Russian oil is a novel approach to sanctions, and, like other new, complex policy tools, it has been occasionally misinterpreted. In this commentary, Professor Catherine Wolfram addresses some of the main misunderstandings she has seen, focusing on a recent Dallas Fed working paper by Killian, Rapson and Schipper, which assesses the impacts of various policies aimed at reducing Russia’s oil revenues after its invasion of Ukraine, including the price cap.
Iron and Steel Decarbonization by 2050
Steel and the steel industry are critical to societies today. Ensuring a sufficient supply of steel for the U.S. economy while deeply reducing greenhouse gas emissions to address climate change will require solutions that integrate community, workforce, competitiveness, trade, and national security priorities. The next Phase 3 case study released by the Roosevelt Project lays out a path for accelerating decarbonization of iron and steel production that benefits workers and communities while strengthening U.S. industry leadership in technology and innovation.
How Simple Monitors Can Prevent Air Pollution-Related Illness
Air pollution is the world’s second-largest cause of death globally, leading to 8.1 million premature deaths annually from lung cancer, heart disease, and emphysema, among other diseases. Regular forest fires are a reminder for many in the U.S. that our air quality can be precarious, but in much of the world’s cities, foul air has been a fact of life for decades. In this article, a group of researchers including Benjamin Krebs, discuss the importance of air quality monitors and how tracking can be improved. Read the full story at Time Magazine.
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The Case for a Clean Energy Marshall Plan
For decades, global integration—of trade, of politics, of technology—was seen as a natural law. Today, integration has been replaced by fragmentation. Geopolitical frictions exist across global supply chains, for vehicles, minerals, computer chips, and more. Against this backdrop, the clean energy transition remains the most important planetary challenge. It also presents the greatest economic opportunity: it will be the largest capital formation event in human history. In an article on Foreign Affairs, MIT Institute Innovation Fellow Brian Deese discusses his thoughts on how the fight against climate change can renew American leadership.
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How Data Centers are Being Used to Bypass Clean Energy Goals
An Op-ed notes that some utilities are choosing to expand or continue fossil fuel generation to address the urgent and growing energy demands of data centers, electric vehicles and electrification. This is contrary to the goals of the clean energy transition and even counter to some of the carbon-free emissions pledges made by the entities building these data centers. However, this new energy load can be accommodated without expanding fossil fuels, if changes to the regulatory framework for how utilities are compensated are enacted – such as performance based regulation, analyzed in a recent CEEPR Working Paper by Professor Paul Joskow. Read the full piece on Utility Dive here.
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Clean Investment
Monitor
The Clean Investment Monitor (CIM) is a joint project of the MIT Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research (CEEPR) and the Rhodium Group. The CIM tracks public and private investments in climate technologies in the United States. Through this data and analysis, the CIM provides insights into investment trends, the effects of federal and state policies, and on-the-ground progress in the U.S. towards net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.
The CIM covers dozens of different technologies and their input components across all sectors of the economy, including for clean electricity and transportation, building electrification, low-emission industrial production, and carbon management.
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Climate Action
Through Education
The MIT Climate Action Through Education (CATE) program, directed by Professor Christopher R. Knittel, has developed an MIT-informed interdisciplinary, place-based climate change curriculum for U.S. high school teachers in the following core disciplines: History/Social Science, English/Language Arts, Math, and Science.
Curricular materials – labs, units, lessons, projects – will be aligned with Next Generation Science Standards, and MA education standards. The solutions-focused curriculum aims to inform students about the causes and consequences of anthropogenic climate change, while equipping them with the knowledge and sense of agency to contribute to climate mitigation, adaptation and resilience.
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Driving Towards
Seamless Public
EV Charging
Widespread electric vehicle (EV) adoption is critical to confronting climate change – but a lack of sufficient public charging infrastructure is holding many potential EV drivers back. A team of researchers from Harvard and the MIT Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research will work to accelerate progress on public EV charging as a gating requirement to achieving widespread EV adoption. The team will contribute by working directly with stakeholders and stakeholder groups to identify barriers to seamless public EV charging, build consensus for solutions, and advance those solutions.
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The Roosevelt
Project
Transitioning the United States economy toward deep decarbonization will have unequally distributed effects, positive and negative, across socio-economic groups, geographies and economic sectors. The concerns of workers and communities adversely affected by the transition must inform the discussion around decarbonization, associated policy changes and institutional development. The goal of the Roosevelt Project is to provide an analytical basis for charting a path to a low carbon economy in a way that promotes high quality job growth, minimizes worker and community dislocation, and harnesses the benefits of energy technologies for regional economic development.
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