I examine the risk/return tradeoff for environmental investments, and its implications for policy choice. Consider a policy to reduce carbon emissions. To what extent does the value of such a policy depend on the expected future damages from global warming versus uncertainty over those damages,...

I examine the risk/return tradeoff for environmental investments, and its implications for policy choice. Consider a policy to reduce carbon emissions. To what extent does the value of such a policy depend on the expected future damages from global warming versus uncertainty over those damages,...

The design of environmental policy typically takes place within a framework in which uncertainty over the future impact of pollution and two different kinds of irreversibilities interact. The first kind of irreversibility concerns the sunk cost of environmental degradation; the second is related...