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...

Recent advances in technology and the consequent decline in manufacturing costs are making energy storage systems a central element of energy and climate change policy debates across the nation. Energy storage systems have the potential to provide many benefits such as lower electricity prices...

This paper presents an estimate of the costs of reducing CO2 emissions as agreed in Kyoto by Annex 1 countries. Unlike most of the existing literature, this paper uses an Almost Ideal Demand System model for energy products to estimate the role of each country within the Annex 1 market. A major...

Carbon taxes remain economists favoured policy tool to curb emissions, but are unpopular among segments of the populations. Theoretical and numerical work tends to show the effectiveness of carbon taxes, but ex-post empirical analyses are still rare. In this paper we attempt to bridge this gap....

A sufficiently rapidly rising carbon tax may increase near-term emissions compared with the case of no carbon tax. Even so, such a carbon tax path may reduce total costs related to climate change, since the tax may reduce total carbon extraction. A government cannot commit to a specific carbon...

A sufficiently rapidly rising carbon tax may increase near-term emissions compared with the case of no carbon tax. Even so, such a carbon tax path may reduce total costs related to climate change, since the tax may reduce total carbon extraction. A government cannot commit to a specific carbon...

This study evaluates the impact of fuel prices on new car purchases, using exhaustive individual-level data of monthly registration of new private cars in France from 2003 to 2007. Detailed information on the car holder enables us to account for heterogeneous preferences across purchasers. We...