Robert N. Stavins

February 26, 2002

"Recent Developments in Climate Science and Policy"

Presentation

By John P. Holdren, Former Director and Faculty Chair, Science, Technology and Public Policy Program and Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

Photo by Robert C. Stowe

May 13, 2009

"Robert Stavins Named to the Energy and Environmental Markets Advisory Committee at the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission"

Press Release

By Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

Robert Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government at Harvard Kennedy School and a member of the Board of Directors at the school's Belfer Center, has been appointed to a new position in the Energy and Environmental Markets Advisory Committee at the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

September 17, 2007

NBER New Program on Environmental and Energy Economics

Press Release

By Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) has launched a new "Program on Environmental and Energy Economics." Martin Feldstein, NBER President, has announced the election of six new NBER Research Associates as part of the program, including two Faculty Fellows of the Harvard Environmental Economics Program (HEEP): Robert Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government at the Kennedy School, and Martin Weitzman, Professor of Economics.

AP Photo

January 2012

The SO2 Allowance Trading System and the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990: Reflections on Twenty Years of Policy Innovation

Report

By Gabe Chan, Research Fellow, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group, Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements, Robert C. Stowe, Executive Director, Harvard Environmental Economics Program; Manager, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements and Richard Sweeney

The introduction of the U.S. SO₂ allowance-trading program to address the threat of acid rain as part of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 is a landmark event in the history of environmental regulation. The program was a great success by almost all measures. Ironically, cap and trade seems especially well suited to addressing the problem of climate change, in that emitted greenhouse gases are evenly distributed throughout the world's atmosphere. Recent hostility toward cap and trade in debates about U.S. climate legislation may reflect the broader political environment of the climate debate more than the substantive merits of market-based regulation.

AP Photo

November 24, 2008

Designing the Post-Kyoto Climate Regime: Lessons from the Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements

Report

By Joseph E. Aldy, Faculty Affiliate, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements and Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

A way forward is needed for the post-2012 period to address the threat of global climate change. The Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements is an international, multi-year, multi-disciplinary effort to help identify the key design elements of a scientifically sound, economically rational, and politically pragmatic post-2012 international policy architecture. Leading thinkers from academia, private industry, government, and non-governmental organizations around the world have contributed and will continue to contribute to this effort. The foundation for the Project is a book published in September 2007 by Cambridge University Press, Architectures for Agreement: Addressing Global Climate Change in the Post-Kyoto World (Aldy and Stavins 2007). From that starting point, the Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements aims to help forge a broad-based consensus on a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. The Project includes 28 research teams operating in Europe, the United States, China, India, Japan, and Australia.

Project Co-Directors Joseph E. Aldy and Robert N. Stavins have written an Interim Progress Report of the Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements for the 14th Conference of the Parties, Framework Convention on Climate Change.

May 2008

Climate Change: Expert Opinion on the Economics of Policy Options to Address Climate Change

Report

By U.S. Government Accountability Office, Joseph E. Aldy, Faculty Affiliate, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements and Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

"...GAO was asked to elicit the opinions of experts on (1) actions the Congress might consider to address climate change and what is known about the potential benefits, costs, and uncertainties of these actions and (2) the key strengths and limitations of policies or actions to address climate change. GAO worked with the National Academy of Sciences to identify a panel of noted economists with expertise in analyzing the economic impacts of climate change policies and gathered their opinions through iterative, Web-based questionnaires. The findings reported here represent the views of the 18 economists who responded to both questionnaires."

Two of the 18 economists who participated were Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements Co-Directors Joseph Aldy and Robert Stavins. In addition, two other participating economists, James Edmonds of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and William Pizer of Resources for the Future, are members of Harvard Project research teams.

November 2007

Linking Tradable Permit Systems for Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Opportunities, Implications, and Challenges

Report

By Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements and Judson Jaffe

"With tradable permit systems for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in place in some parts of the world and actively being considered in others, increasing attention has been given to the opportunity to link these systems. Linking occurs when the government that maintains one system allows regulated entities to use allowances or credits from another system to meet domestic compliance obligations."

AP Images

December 18, 2007

Bali Climate Change Conference: Key Takeaways

Summary Report

By Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements and Joseph E. Aldy, Faculty Affiliate, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

The Bali climate change conference was a qualified success. Before we went to Bali, we observed that it will be good news if there’s no bad news coming out of the negotiations.  This was achieved, and then some.

October 2007

"A U.S. Cap-and-Trade System to Address Global Climate Change"

Working Paper

By Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements

In a paper commissioned by the Brookings Institution's Hamilton Project, Stavins, the co-director of the Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements (HPICA) proposes "a specific cap-and-trade system with several key features including: an upstream cap on CO2 emissions with gradual inclusion of other greenhouse gases; a gradual downward trajectory of emissions ceilings over time to minimize disruption and allow firms and households time to adapt; and mechanisms to reduce cost uncertainty."