September 11, 2019

Diary of a Wimpy Carbon Tax: Carbon Taxes as Federal Climate Policy

In a new CEEPR Working Paper, Professor Christopher Knittel models the carbon price needed to achieve projected emission reductions under Obama-era vehicle mileage standards, the Clean Power Plan, and a biofuel mandate. He found that a federal carbon price of $7 in 2020 could reduce emissions by the same amount as all of the flagship climate policies adopted by the Obama administration.

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August 12, 2019

Massachusetts needs congestion pricing now

In an Op-ed in the Boston Globe, CEEPR faculty member and MIT Sloan Mitsui Career Development Professor David Keith provides insights in response to MassDOT’s report on traffic congestion.

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August 1, 2019

Implementing Negative Emissions Technologies

Negative emissions technologies (NETs) are increasingly looked to as a lever to achieve committed decarbonization goals. However, such technologies raise urgent technical questions around their risks, costs, and benefits. In a new CEEPR Working Paper, MIT Institute Professor John Deutch presents several options for the creation of a NET innovation program to promote their development and deployment, and discusses their implications.

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July 15, 2019

Spatial and Temporal Variation in the Value of Solar Power across U.S. Electricity Markets

Researchers combine electricity prices, emissions rates, and weather data to map the changing value of PV at ~10,000 locations across the US. Cost declines are found to have outrun value declines, such that the energy, capacity, health, and climate benefits of PV outweigh utility-scale PV costs at the majority of locations modeled.

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July 1, 2019

Decentralized Economic Dispatch for Radial Electric Distribution Systems

Innovative methods for dispatching power at the residential level must be explored as more DERs are entering the market. This CEEPR Working Paper explains how power dispatching works today, and introduces an alternative, decentralized method that accounts for DERs such as rooftop solar and electric vehicles.

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July 1, 2019

MITEI awards seven Seed Fund grants for early-stage energy research

Namrata Kala and Christopher Knittel plan to examine key policy levers for meeting electricity demand and renewable energy growth without jeopardizing system reliability in the developing world.

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