Economics of Climate Change

Economics 40534

Spring 2023

Professor Nelson Mark

 

Syllabus

 

Some Useful and Interesting Climate Websites

Berkeley Earth

US Environmental Protectation Agency

NASA

NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)

 

Course Schedule

 

Week 1. The Science of Climate Change and Emission Scenerios

                        January 17-19

Read:    Tol, chapters 1 and 2

            WW chapter 1, 5 and 6

                        Pope Francis encyclical (optional) (full text here)

            Slides:   Slide Deck 01

                         Slide Deck 02

 

Week 2. Empirical Evidence on Economic Damages

                        January 24 (quiz 1)

                        January 26 (problem set 1).

            Read:    Tol chapter 5.1

Tol chapter 6

                        Heal and Park. “Temperature Stress and Direct impact of Climate Change”.

            Slides:   Slide Deck 03

            Problem set 1: Excel File for PS01 and Problem Set 1

 

 

Week 3. Empirical evidence (continued)

January 31 (quiz 2)

Read (look over introduction, data, main results):

Cook, Nikolai and Anthony Heyes, “Brain freeze: outdoor cold and indoor cognitive performance”.

Somanathan, et al. (2021) “The Impact of Temperature on Productivity and Labor Supply: Evidence from Indian Manufacturing”

Cachon, Gerald P., Santiago Gallino, and Marcelo Olivares, “Severe Weather and Automobile Assembly Productivity”

New York Times article on  Climate Start-Ups

 

Slides: Slide Deck 04

 

 

For Thursday:

            Read:    Carleton and Hsiang. “Social and Economic Impacts of Climate”.

Hsiang and many coauthors. “Estimating Economic Damage from Climate Change in the United States.”

            Slides: Slide Deck 05

 

Week 4: Indirect Evidence on Economic Damages

February 7 (quiz 3) on Dell, Jones and Olken

            Read:    Dell, Jones, and Olken, “Temperature Shocks and Economic Growth.”

            Slides:   Slide Deck 06

            February 9

            Read: Berg, Curtis, and Mark, “GDP and Temperature”.

            Problem set 2: Hard copy here

 

Week 5: Policy Instruments

            February 14 (quiz 4).

Read: Tol chapter 4.1-4.4 for Tuesday. Quiz will cover this part. Read for basic ideas, not details. Also pay attention to the Boxes.

Slides: Slide Deck 07

           

Week 6: Policy Instruments (continued)

            February 21 NO QUIZ

            Read Tol chapter 4.7-4.10

 

            February 23

            Read Tol Chapter 9.1-9.3 and Chapter 10.2

            Slide Deck 08

            Problem Set 3. Due Tuesday 2/28/2023 in class.

 

Week 7: Uncertainty in Climate Change Economics

            February 28: Slide Deck 09

 

Week 8: Review for midterm and midterm.

 

Week 9: Thursday March 23. Uncertainty (continued) Notes on uncertainty

 

Week 10: Tuesday March 28 Uncertainty (continued).

            Thursday March 30: Uncertainty: The Dismal Theorem

            Problem Set 4

 

Week 11: Tuesday April 4: Overview of Tol’s Integrated Assessment Model (MLIAM)

            Thursday April 6: We start building the model. Bring your laptop to class.

            Excel worksheet: MLIAM01_Class.xlsx

MLIAM02 Notes

 

Week 12: Tuesday April 11:  Excel worksheet: MLIAM02_Class.xlsx

Week 13: Tuesday April 18:  Excel worksheets: MLIAM03_Class.xlsx, MLIAM04_Class.xlsx and some notes: Notes MLIAM02-04

            Thursday April 20: Use this Excel worksheet: MLIAM05.xlsx to do Problem Set 6

 

Week 14: All my notes on MLIAM and MLIAM06_Class.xlsx to compute the SCC

 

Problem sets 4-6 solutions:

PS04_Soln.pdf

PS05_Soln.pdf

PS06_Soln.pdf

 

Final Exam Location 138 DBRT 1:45-3:45 p.m. Monday 8 May.