This policy note investigates whether the current level of public support to environment-friendly technologies is sufficient to allow European countries to respond to the multiple challenges posed by climate change and other environmental concerns. We first lay out the justifications for...

That climate policies are costly is evident and therefore often creates major fears. But the alternative (no action) also has a cost. Mitigation costs and damages incurred depend on what the climate policies are; moreover, they are substitutes. This brings climate policies naturally in the realm...

It has been argued that a depletable resource owner might optimally increase near-term supply in response to environmental policies promoting the development of alternative resources, which might render climate policy ineffective or even counterproductive. This paper empirically confirms this...

We study the variation of global and unilateral carbon price recommendations and their determinants. To this end, we provide survey evidence on carbon pricing from more than 400 experts across almost 40 countries. We quantify the extent of (dis-)agreement and reveal that a majority of experts...

We provide ex-post empirical analysis of the effects of climate policies on carbon dioxide emissions at the aggregate national level. Our results are based on a comprehensive database of 121 countries. As climate policies we examine carbon taxes and emissions trading systems (ETS), as well as...

We introduce a "smart" cap and trade system that eliminates the welfare costs of asymmetric information (“uncertainty”). This cap responds endogenously to technology or macroeconomic shocks, relying on the market price of certificates to aggregate information. It allows policy makers to...

The UK has pledged to cut greenhouse gases 68 percent below 1990 levels by 2030, to be emissions neutral by 2050, and to phase out internal combustion engine vehicles by 2030. Much progress has been made, but fully achieving these ambitious objectives with the current policy framework will be...

Creativity is often highly concentrated in time and space, and across different domains. What explains the formation and decay of clusters of creativity? We match data on notable individuals born in Europe between the XIth and the XIXth century with historical city data. The production and...