One of the first actions of the Environmental Protection Agency after the declaration of the COVID-19 crisis in mid-March 2020 was to announce that it would relax its enforcement policies with respect to environmental reporting and violations during the time of the pandemic. Ostensibly this was...

The statistical evidence of the study here shows that countries with a low average COVID-19 fatality rate have high expenditures in health sector and a lower exposure of population to air pollution, regardless a higher percentage of population aged more than 65 years. This study suggests that...

In Mexico, voluntary environmental incentive programs such as the Clean Industry certificates are hugely complementary to the traditional command-and-control regulations. Due to the limited resources of the regulatory agency, enrollment in voluntary programs offers the incentive of public...

This paper investigates the impact of a pioneering pollution reduction program, the Ecological Compensation Initiative (ECI) in China, which establishes side payments between upstream and downstream provinces along the same river. The program includes both Coasian and pay-for-performance...

Decarbonization and electrification will require a transformed electricity grid. Our long-run model of entry and exit of generation and storage capacity captures crucial aspects of the electricity industry such as time-varying demand for electricity, intermittency of renewables, and...

This paper assesses the role of heating entitlements in generating stark air quality differences across China. During the 1950-1980 central planning period, the Chinese government established free winter heating of homes and offices as a basic right via the provision of free coal fuel for...

We study the effects of a large car scrappage scheme in Germany on new car purchases and local air quality by combining vehicle registration data with data on local air pollutant emissions. For identification we exploit cross-sectional variation across districts in the number of cars eligible...

We study the effects of a large car scrappage scheme in Germany on new car purchases and local air quality by combining vehicle registration data with data on local air pollutant emissions. For identification we exploit cross-sectional variation across districts in the number of cars eligible...

During the 2009 Pittsburgh Summit, G20 leaders recognized the harmful effects of inefficient fossil fuel subsidies on markets and the environment, and committed to “rationalize and phase out over the medium term inefficient fossil fuels subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption.” To...

I develop a general framework for ex-ante analysis of a policy's effect on productivity. I use it to study the effect of carbon taxation on power plant productivity in the United States. Carbon taxes increase the price of burning fossil fuels, potentially encouraging power plants to be more fuel...