Energy Economics and Finance Seminar
Speaker
Location
Kleinman Center Classroom
Fisher Fine Arts Building, Room 306
Getting Here
Event Summary
The seminar series in Energy Economics & Finance (EEF) is jointly organized by Wharton’s Business Economics and Public Policy Department, the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy, and Wharton’s Business, Climate and Environment Lab. The scope of the seminar includes regulation and policy papers. The scope of the seminar also includes environmental and transportation issues, as long as there is a connection with energy. Sessions are biweekly on Mondays from 3:30 p.m. – 4:30 p.m. Snacks, beer, and wine will be served after the seminar, should University COVID guidance allow for it.
For Spring 2022, the seminar will be held in-person in the Kleinman Center Classroom (Fisher Fine Arts Building Room 306). We have a strong preference for in-person seminar attendance***, but if you are unable to make a certain session or are not based on Penn’s campus, please reach out to Dhivya Kaushik (email below) to get access to the Zoom link.
Find and add a Google Calendar version of the schedule on the BEPP seminar page.
To sign up for the seminar, please send your name, email, and affiliation to Dhivya Kaushik: dhivya@wharton.upenn.edu
***A note on in-person attendance:
The Kleinman Center for Energy Policy is following the University of Pennsylvania’s COVID-19 guidelines. All in-person attendees are required to wear a mask (double masking, or use of a KN95 or N95 mask, is required in Penn buildings) and must show either a green PennOpen Pass (for active members of the Penn community) OR green PennOpen Campus Pass (for visitors, including event attendees) upon arrival to be admitted into the event.
You must complete your PennOpen Pass screening on your cell phone or computer on the day of the event, before arriving at the Kleinman Center. You will present the pass on your phone to Kleinman Center staff when checking in. Find more information about PennOpen Campus and how it works.
TALK TITLE: Carbon prices, preferences, and the timing of uncertainty
Abstract: Uncertainty is persistent features of climate economics. Two prominent recent manifestations are an emphasis on tail risks and on Epstein-Zin (EZ) preferences. We explore both numerically in the DICE model and find that neither escapes decades-old discounting debates. The greater are climate sensitivity tail risks, the longer it takes to reach equilibrium temperatures, bringing discounting back to the fore. Similarly, our numerical EZ explorations show the importance of the elasticity of intertemporal substitution relative to risk aversion, pointing back to the crucial role of normative judgments around discounting far-distant futures. There appears to be no escaping economics’ philosophical roots.
Gernot Wagner
Spring 2022 Seminar Schedule
- 2/21: Gernot Wagner, New York University
- 3/14: Mathias Reynaert, Toulouse School of Economics
- 4/4: Wolfram Schlenker, Columbia University
- 4/18: Shuang Zhang, University of Colorado-Boulder
- 4/25: Michael Barnett, Arizona State University
- 5/9: Meera Mahadevan, University of California Irvine