There is a large number of regional agreements concerning Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions, often linked to other regional integration agreements. The most successful one in making effort in reducing carbon emissions is the Emission Trading System by the European Union (EU ETS). Apart from this...

We use a two-period model to investigate intertemporal effects of cost reductions in climate change mitigation technologies for the power sector. With imperfect climate policies, cost reductions related to carbon capture and storage (CCS) may be more desirable than comparable cost reductions...

Regulators often seek to promote the use of improved, cleaner technology when new investments occur; however, technology mandates are suspected of raising costs and delaying investment. We examine investment choices for electricity generation under a strict emissions rate performance standard...

A concern of many environmentalists is that the use of biomass energy will decimate the forests. Searchinger et al. (2008, 2009) examined this issue related to corn ethanol and suggested that substituting corn ethanol for petroleum would increase carbon emissions associated with the land...

Owing to the extensive critique of food-crop-based biofuels, attention and hopes have turned toward second-generation wood-based biofuels. An important question is therefore whether wood from boreal forests could serve as a source for biofuels. However, in a typical boreal forest, it takes...

The electricity sector is responsible for roughly 40 percent of U.S. carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, and a shift away from conventional coal-fired generation is an important component of the U.S. strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Toward that goal, several proposals for a clean energy...

New Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards were recently passed in the United States with the twin goals of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and oil use. The new standards represent a dramatic change from recent policy. This paper examines the key features of the new rules, and...

Three types of policies that are prominent in the federal debate over addressing greenhouse gas emissions in the United States are a cap-and-trade program (CTP) on emissions, a renewable portfolio standard (RPS) for electricity production, and tax credits for renewable electricity producers....

We describe three essential elements of an effective post-2012 international global climate policy architecture: a means to ensure that key industrialized and developing nations are involved in differentiated but meaningful ways; an emphasis on an extended time path of targets; and inclusion of...