market-based environmental policies Archives - Page 12 of 37

A Key Element for the Forthcoming Paris Climate Agreement

The upcoming Paris climate negotiations will constitute a critical step in the ongoing international process to reduce global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The question of whether the Paris outcome will be sufficiently ambitious to put the world on a path towards limiting global average warming to 2^o C, as agreed in Cancun, can be answered now. It will not, because that target, while possibly useful as an aspirational goal, is not achievable, as the most recent report of Working Group III of the IPCC documented. What is clear, however, is that greater ambition is more easily realized when costs are low. Market-based mechanisms are an important element in the portfolio of actions that can lead to cost-effective solutions. Linkage – between and among market and non-market systems for reducing GHG emissions – is a closely-related key element.

In an article just published in Climate Policy, “Facilitating Linkage of Climate Policies through the Paris Outcome,” my co-authors – Daniel Bodansky of Arizona State University, Seth Hoedl of Harvard Law School, and Gilbert Metcalf of Tufts University – and I examine how the Paris outcome, and more generally the ongoing climate negotiations, can allow for and advance linked systems.

Brief Background

In the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action, adopted by the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 2011, the parties agreed to develop a “protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force under the Convention applicable to all Parties,” for adoption at COP-21 in December, 2015, in Paris. It is likely that the Paris outcome will reflect a hybrid climate policy architecture – one that combines top-down elements, such as for monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV), with bottom-up elements, including “Intended Nationally Determined Contributions” (INDCs), describing what a country intends to do to reduce emissions, based on domestic political feasibility and other factors. This outcome will be embodied in a core agreement, which likely will be legally binding, as well as ancillary instruments such as annexes, national schedules, and COP decisions.

The ability to link regional, national, and sub-national climate policies will be essential to enhancing the cost-effectiveness of such a system – and thus the likelihood of achieving significant global emissions reductions. By ‘linkage’, we mean formal recognition by a GHG mitigation program in one jurisdiction (a regional, national, or sub-national government) of emission reductions undertaken in another jurisdiction for the purposes of complying with the first jurisdiction’s requirements.

First Necessity for Paris: Do No Harm

The minimum requirement for the Paris agreement in regard to linkage is to do no harm. Silence on linkage could possibly accomplish that. But any provisions in the agreement that would require nations to achieve their respective INDCs exclusively within their own borders – a constraint that has been favored by the ALBA countries – would, in effect, prohibit not only international carbon markets but any sort of meaningful linkage (and would thereby greatly drive up costs).

Common Definitions of Key Terms

If linkage is to play a significant role in a hybrid international policy architecture, then several categories of design elements merit serious consideration for inclusion in the Paris outcome, either directly or by establishing a process for subsequent international negotiations. In general, effective linkage requires common definitions of key terms, including particularly the units to be used for compliance purposes. This will be particularly important for links between heterogeneous systems, and it is an area where a model rule could be particularly helpful (more about this below).

Registries and Tracking

Linkage requires registries and tracking mechanisms, whether the systems being linked are homogeneous or heterogeneous. Indeed, a key role for the top-down part of a hybrid architecture that allows for international linkage of national policy instruments will be the tracking, reporting, and recording of allowance unit transactions.

International compliance units would make the functioning of an international transaction log more straightforward and reduce the administrative burden of reconciling international registries with national registries. Minimum standards for approving and measuring offsets may be important. Market oversight and monitoring may increase confidence in the system, although in some cases, national and international institutions that can provide oversight already exist and may need only relatively minor additional capacity to assume these functions.

Too Much of a Good Thing Can be Bad

Including detailed linkage rules in the core agreement is not desirable as this could make it difficult for rules to evolve in light of experience. Instead, minimum standards to ensure environmental integrity should be elaborated in COP decisions, or by other means; for example, the COP could establish minimum requirements for national monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV), registries, and crediting mechanisms.

In terms of linkage, the function of the core agreement might be confined to articulating general principles relating to environmental integrity, while also authorizing the COP or another organization to develop more detailed rules. Whatever minimum standards are adopted, oversight of compliance will be important to ensure the integrity both of the Paris outcome and of linked national systems.

The Utility of Default or Model Rules

Many elements of GHG linkage can be addressed through default or model rules from which nations are free to deviate at their discretion. Rules that may benefit from this approach are typically concerned with the details of linking two regulatory systems. For example, nations interested in linking their cap-and-trade systems would have to consider rules for market coverage, cost containment, banking and borrowing, compliance periods, allocation methods, and the treatment of new emitters and emitter closures. Additional rules may be needed for linking of heterogeneous systems.

Developing uniform rules to address all of these issues is unrealistic. Instead, a degree of harmonization could be achieved through default rules that facilitate linkage by providing a common framework for nations to use when developing their own linkage agreements. Although there is no need for the core agreement itself to elaborate harmonized linkage rules, it might authorize the COP to develop default linkage rules that nations can use in negotiating bilateral linkage agreements.

Less is More

In our Climate Policy article, Dan Bodansky, Seth Hoedl, Gib Metcalf, and I conclude that the most valuable outcome of Paris regarding linkage might simply be the inclusion in the core agreement of an explicit statement that parties may transfer portions of their INDCs to other parties and that these transferred units may be used by the transferees to implement their INDCs. Such a statement would help provide certainty both to governments and private market participants. This minimalist approach will allow diverse forms of linkage to arise, among what will inevitably be highly heterogeneous INDCs, thereby advancing the dual objectives of cost effectiveness and environmental integrity in the international climate policy regime.

Crude Oil Prices, Climate Change, and Global Welfare

A few weeks ago, I participated in a panel session titled, “The Remarkable Transformation of the Energy Sector: Does it Also Transform Our World.” The motivating question was: “Is the dramatic decline in oil prices a complete gift to the West because of the enormous funds being saved, or is it an unintended Trojan horse because development of renewable energy as well as new fossil-fuel sources will decline in the West, posing longer new challenges?”

The other members of the panel – from private industry – had vastly more expertise (and relevant insights) on fossil-fuel markets, but here’s what I had to say. This is hardly at the sweet spot of my professional competence, so I welcome your comments and corrections! In general, how would you answer that question?

Causes

I start (and started) from the premise that the dramatic decline in crude oil prices that took place from August, 2014 ($96/barrel), to March, 2015 ($44/barrel), was due – on the one hand – to decreased demand, a function of slow economic growth in Asia, Europe, and elsewhere, endogenous, price-driven technological change leading to greater fuel efficiency, and policy-driven technological change that also has been leading to greater fuel efficiency, such as more stringent Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards in the United States; and – on the other hand – was due to increased supply, partly a function of the growth of unconventional (tight) U.S. oil production (a product of the combination of two technologies – horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing). And, in the presence of all of this, Saudi Arabia decided not to restrict its output to prop up prices.

[Before proceeding, I should note that since May of this year, crude oil prices have increased by about 30% from their March low, but as of May ($60/barrel) are still far below their August 2014 level.]

Consequences

When one examines virtually any significant price change from an economic perspective, there inevitably seems to be both good news and bad news. So with the fall in crude oil prices.

The Bad News

First of all, I assume that low crude oil prices are problematic for the economic and political stability of some of the oil-producing/exporting countries, including Saudi Arabia, Russia, Venezuela, and Nigeria. (For details, see Bordoff and Losz 2015, below.)

Second, it’s frequently been asserted that low oil prices are bad news for the development of alternative forms of energy, including renewable sources. Of course, in the United States, there isn’t much effect on electricity generation from renewable (wind and solar), because in the U.S. electricity sector, renewable supplies compete with coal and natural gas, not with fuel oil (but in other countries, which use more fuel oil for electricity generation than we do, there can be a disincentive for renewable dispatch – and hence development).

Third, there can be – indeed, has been – a major impact in the U.S. motor fuels sector, where the market for biofuels (mainly ethanol) is negatively affected by low conventional gasoline prices. However, these impacts must be somewhat muted by public policies, which directly or indirectly subsidize (or, in fact, require) the use of biofuels.

Fourth, low gasoline prices have resulted in decreased demand by consumers for motor vehicles with high fuel efficiency, and SUV and pickup truck sales have rebounded from previous lows. But these effects are also muted, to some degree, by public policies, including U.S. CAFE standards. Finally, low gasoline prices also have short-term effects in the form of more driving and fuel use by the existing fleet of motor vehicles, which is bad news in terms of emissions (and congestion).

Differences across Sectors

Before turning to the “good news” about low crude oil prices (and there surely is good news), it’s worthwhile noting that whether individual businesses find these low prices to be good or bad depends largely upon the economic sector in which they operate. For example, whereas commercial airlines are finally making profits, due to the low price of jet fuel (their most important variable operating cost), manufacturers of commercial aircraft will see lower demand for new planes if low jet fuel prices become the long-term norm. The primary factor driving the larger airlines to replace aircraft in their fleets is the lower operating costs due to the much greater fuel efficiency of new models.

And, of course, low oil prices are systematically bad news for oil producers, including the major U.S. companies.

The Good News

Finally, here is the upside of these significant changes in crude oil markets.

Low oil prices are unambiguously good for aggregate global welfare. This includes consumers in the United States, Europe, Japan, and South Korea. And, at least temporarily, OPEC seems to have lost its ability to set a price floor.

Low oil prices mean an increase in consumers’ disposable income, amounting to nearly $2,500 per U.S. household annually, according to Stephen Brown (see below). If we subtract the income losses to U.S. oil producers, the net gain per U.S. household amounts to a bit more than $800 per year, with gains accruing disproportionately to low-income households.

Turning to the environmental realm, there is also good news, or at least the possibility of good news. An opportunity for new, sensible energy and climate change policies has emerged with these low oil prices.

First, now is the time to reduce – or better yet, phase out – costly and inefficient fuel subsidies, which exist in many parts of the world, particularly in developing countries.

Second, with gasoline prices relatively low – and natural gas supplies holding down electricity prices, at least in the United States – there has never been a better time to introduce progressive climate policies in the form of carbon-pricing, whether via carbon taxes or through carbon cap-and-trade. Unfortunately, none of us should hold our breath waiting for that to happen.

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For further reading, I recommend:

Bordoff, Jason, and Akos Losz. “Oil Shock: Decoding the Causes and Consequences of the 2014 Oil Price Drop.” Horizons, Spring 2015, Issue No. 3, pp. 190-206.

Brown, Stephen P. A. “Falling Oil Prices: Implications in the United States.” Resources, Number 189. Washington: Resources for the Future, 2015, pp. 40-44.

When Reasonable Policy Discussions Become Unreasonable Personal Attacks

Recently I was reminded of the controversy that erupted late in 2014 about remarks made by the distinguished health economist, Jonathan Gruber, professor at MIT for two decades. Professor Gruber, one of the country’s leading experts on health policy, had played an important role in the construction of the Obama administration’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, subsequently derided by its political opponents as “Obamacare.”

A brief but intense political controversy and media feeding-frenzy erupted when videos surfaced in which Professor Gruber – largely in a series of academic seminars and conferences – explained how the Act was crafted and marketed in ways that would make it easier to develop political support. For example, he noted that insurance companies were taxed instead of patients, fundamentally the same thing economically, but vastly more palatable politically. He went on to note that this was possible because of “the lack of economic understanding of the American voter.” His key point was that the program’s “lack of transparency is a huge political advantage.” Is that a controversial or even unique observation?

A Truism of Political Economy

Any economist who has worked on the development or analysis of public policy – in areas ranging from health care policy to environmental policy to financial regulation – recognizes the truth of the key insight Gruber was communicating to his audiences. It is inevitably in the interests of the advocates of a policy to make the policy’s benefits transparent and to make its costs vague, even unobservable; just as it is in the interests of the opponents of a policy to make that policy’s benefits obscure and its costs as clear as the light of day.

The specific construction of hundreds of public policies are explained by this truism. In the United States, Corporate Average Fuel Economy Standards (or “CAFE standards”) have been a bipartisan Congressional success, despite the fact that the costs they place on the American public per unit of fuel savings are vastly greater than the costs of a commensurate increase in gasoline taxes. Likewise, when conservative opponents of CO₂ cap-and-trade wanted to stop the House-passed bill in its tracks, they resorted to demonizing it as “cap-and-tax.”

So, the central lesson Professor Gruber was offering is hardly controversial, and its enunciation ought not lead to the terrible attacks that he suffered. He doesn’t need me to defend him, but he was unfairly demonized, simply because people disagreed with him politically regarding the merits of the public policy he had helped develop and support.

Unfortunately, I was reminded of this recently when I found myself subject to attempted demonization, because someone did not agree with a policy I supported. What happened to me is trivial compared with what Professor Gruber has gone through, but it prompts me to write about it today.

Can We Agree to Disagree?

I have written before at this blog about the reasons why I support my university’s decision not to divest its endowment of its fossil-fuel company holdings. I won’t repeat those arguments here, but will note that I have gone out of my way not to draw conclusions or make recommendations about what other universities or other institutions ought to do in this regard, including when I agreed to write an essay on the subject for Yale Environment 360. My analysis and conclusions were not developed in spite of my decades of research, teaching, and outreach on global climate change policy; rather, they were developed because of my years of work in this area.

There are people, some of whom I greatly respect, who have different perspectives on this issue, and have come to very different conclusions than have I. We have essentially agreed to disagree. They haven’t cast aspersions on me, nor I on them. As my writings on this topic have illustrated, there are many facets to the issue, including economics, politics, ethics, and even religion. No one has cornered the market on wisdom.

And What About the Keystone XL Pipeline?

Likewise, on a quite different topic, on January 8, 2015, Coral Davenport wrote a story in the New York Times about the political debates in Washington regarding the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, and stated that “… most energy and policy experts say the battle over Keystone overshadows the importance of the project as an environmental threat or an engine of the economy. The pipeline will have little effect, they say, on climate change, production of the Canadian oil sands, gasoline prices and the overall job market in the United States.” She went on to quote me (accurately) as having said, “The political fight about Keystone is vastly greater than the economic, environmental or energy impact of the pipeline itself. It doesn’t make a big difference in energy prices, employment or climate change either way.” What I said was consistent with the evidence at the time (note, however, that as oil prices fall, the possibility increases that the Canadian oil sands would be uneconomic to develop without the pipeline). Once again, the analysis is not one-dimensional, and reasonable people can respectfully disagree.

When Policy Debates Become Personal Attacks

But these two topics – the Keystone XL pipeline and fossil-fuel divestment – have increasingly become engulfed in highly-charged campaigns and exceptionally heated political debates. As part of this, my integrity was recently attacked, because of my views. A young and – I’m sure – well-intentioned climate activist and journalist, writing in the Huffington Post, implied that my assessment in the New York Times of the Washington political debates regarding Keystone XL and my support for Harvard’s divestment policy, are because “Stavins has done consulting work for Chevron, Exelon, Duke Energy and the Western States Petroleum Association.”

The author of the Huffington Post piece selected those three companies and one trade association from a list of 92 “Outside Activities” that I voluntarily provide as a means of public disclosure. The author chose not to note that the vast majority of my outside engagements are with universities, think tanks, environmental advocacy NGOs, foundations, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, other federal agencies and departments, international organizations, and environment ministries around the world (not to mention a set of Major League Baseball teams, but that’s another story altogether).

But what about the four he did choose to highlight? First, I am very proud of my work supported by Chevron and the closely-related Western States Petroleum Association, in which I have carried out a series of analyses studying how to strengthen and improve California’s climate policy under AB-32. That’s right – developing and assessing ways to make the AB-32 cap-and-trade system and the related suite of “complementary policies” more environmentally effective, more cost-effective, and more equitable (I’ve written about this work several times at this blog).

Likewise, my work supported by Duke Energy began a decade ago when I helped the former CEO bring home to his senior management the importance of climate change and the importance of well-designed public policies (in particular, carbon cap-and-trade) to address it. All of my subsequent work supported by Duke Energy likewise has focused on the design of better market-based instruments – cap-and-trade – to reduce CO₂ emissions.

And, finally, what about Exelon? This was interesting and important work I carried out with my friend and colleague, MIT Professor Richard Schmalensee, Dean Emeritus of the Sloan School of Management (I wrote about this work at this blog and at the Huffington Post). In 2011, with support from Exelon, Professor Schmalensee and I analyzed EPA’s proposals for new rules to regulate the interstate transport of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides emitted from electric power generation facilities. You can read in detail about our multi-faceted assessment, but the bottom-line is that we provided strong support for a stringent rule. Our brief summary at the University of Pennsylvania’s RegBlog concludes: “In sum, while imposing incremental costs to achieve reductions in SO2 and NOX emissions, the Transport Rule would produce significant benefits in terms of improved health outcomes, and better environmental amenities and services, which studies estimate significantly outweigh the costs.”

Sadness and Empathy

It is nothing less than absurd – and, frankly, quite sad – that someone would suggest that my views on divestment and my New York Times quote on the politics of Keystone XL were somehow due to my having received previous support for analytical work for an oil company, a trade association, and two electric utilities. This was an unfortunate move to question my credibility and damage my reputation in a misguided attempt to demonize me, rather than engage in reasonable discussion and debate. Unfortunately, most of those who have read the activist/journalist’s original commentary and have possibly repeated his claims to others will not see the essay you have just read.

This is surely nothing compared with what Professor Gruber has gone through, but it has certainly increased my empathy for him, as well as my admiration.

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Personal Attacks: An Even Sadder Epilogue

It’s nearly two months since I wrote the essay above, but a series of recent events prompts me to add this sad epilogue. My family and I have recently been subject to cyber-bullying, harassment, and threats, because of my public stance in support of Harvard’s decision not to divest from its endowment portfolio its holdings of fossil-fuel company stocks.

In particular, the most recent message sent to me said in part: “You may be assured that I will have a lot to say about your vocal public support of Harvard’s fossil fuel investments, … and that I have a particular interest in making sure that [your] financial connections to the fossil fuel industry are made fully public …” This threat to tarnish my reputation by publicizing a supposed conflict of interest is striking for a number of reasons:

In several essays at this blog and elsewhere, I have carefully explained my reasons for supporting Harvard’s decision not to divest;
In several essays at this blog and elsewhere, I have been completely up front about receiving support for (publically available) analytical work I’ve carried out for private-sector companies (and have long provided a list of all outside engagements at my website);
In the essay above, I documented the fundamentally pro-environment, policy-analytic work I had done for the specific companies mentioned; and
The claim that my position regarding Harvard divestment has somehow been influenced by my work with an oil company and an industry trade association defies logic.

The last item on this list – the fundamental illogic of such a claim – merits explanation. People on all sides of the divestment issue (including leaders of the student movement, and including the person who wrote the threat I quoted above) acknowledge that divestment will have no direct financial impacts on the respective companies. Rather, the merit of divestment that is most frequently cited by supporters is its symbolic value. Because divestment has no financial impacts on the fossil-fuel companies, those companies don’t care much about it. They would not care one way or the other what I might have to say on the topic. Hence, even if I did want to curry favor with those companies, that would not lead me (or anyone else) to take a particular position on the divestment issue.

The more important question to ask is whether my research, teaching, and outreach initiatives on climate change economics and policy have been biased by my having carried out consulting assignments for an oil company and trade association (two of a hundred outside engagements over the past several years)? That is, if there really was a conflict of interest, then in an effort to make those companies happy, I would presumably pull my punches regarding recommendations of what does matter to those companies – public policies that will reduce their profits by increasing their costs of doing business and/or by reducing demand for their products. But nothing could be further from the truth!

For a decade or more, my research, teaching, and outreach have focused on more enlightened, stronger, and better climate change policies. I have been outspoken in regard to the pressing need for well-designed carbon-price instruments at the national and sub-national levels, and for the need for better, more effective international climate policies, both under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and through other venues. This is reflected in my published research, my teaching, and my outreach efforts, including through this blog.

It is ironic, offensive, and sad that anyone would suggest that my support of Harvard’s divestment position is somehow tied to my outside engagements. That suggestion – and the recent threats I have received – defies logic and is contradicted by the record.