Retaining Diablo Canyon: Economic, Carbon, and Reliability Implications

California’s SB 100 bill has committed the state to decarbonize its power grid, with a goal of 60% renewable energy by 2030 and 100% clean electric retail sales by 2045. Plans and resource procurements are falling into place to pursue those goals, including through the California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC’s) recent Mid-Term Reliability Procurement Order and the ongoing Integrated Resource Plan and Long Term Procurement Plan.

Using Brattle’s gridSIM model, we then compare the world with such an investment to one without. gridSIM is a state-of-the-art electricity capacity expansion and operations simulation model comparable to RESOLVE. We start with a …

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How Regional Federal Reserve Banks Can Contend with Economic Risk from Climate Change

Climate change, in addition to endangering human health and safety, poses a significant risk to the U.S. financial system and important parts of our economy. For example, coastal economies are harmed by more frequent and powerful hurricanes; agriculture is suffering from worse droughts; and businesses, residences, and people in or near wildfire areas are threatened both by the wildfires themselves and the air pollution they cause. The Federal Reserve System—the central bank of the United States—is directed to safeguard the stability of the financial system and contain systemic risks, promote the safety and soundness of individual financial institutions, maintain stable… View Full Resource

Emissions Embedded in Global Trade

Emissions generated anywhere on the planet contribute to global warming. But there are no globally uniform climate policies. Instead, decarbonization policies are made at the national or local level. Countries around the world continue to develop and implement unilateral climate mitigation policies as goods and services flow across national borders. As global trade rises, it is important to assess whether addressing emissions in international trade would drive global decarbonization. This paper provides an overview of global emissions trends, including the emissions trends of developed and developing countries; the world’s biggest polluters; and small, open economies. The analyses and data in …

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Barriers and Opportunities for Green Jobs in New Jersey

Senior Researcher Bryndis Woods, PhD, Researcher Joshua Castigliego, Assistant Researchers Elisabeth Seliga and Sachin Peddada, Researcher Tanya Stasio, PhD, and Senior Economist Liz Stanton, PhD prepared a report that assesses New Jersey’s current clean energy workforce, identifies barriers to green jobs that impede access to—and equitable representation within—the clean energy sector, and provides recommendations regarding how the State of New Jersey can shape policy and regulations to enhance the equity, diversity and inclusion of its clean energy jobs. AEC staff find that there are important barriers to green jobs that reinforce existing inequities in New Jersey’s clean energy workforce, including: …

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Economic Impacts of a Clean Energy Transition in New Jersey

Researcher Joshua Castigliego, Assistant Researchers Sagal Alisalad and Sachin Peddada, and Senior Economist Liz Stanton, PhD prepared a report on the economic impacts associated with a clean energy transition in New Jersey that aims to achieve the State’s climate and energy goals in the coming decades. AEC staff find that adding in-state renewables and storage, and electrifying transportation and buildings creates additional job opportunities, while also bolstering the state’s economy. From 2025 to 2050, AEC estimates that New Jersey’s clean energy transition will result in almost 300,000 more “job-years” (an average of about 11,000 jobs per year) than would be …

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Why Supply Chain Emission Disclosure Is Necessary for Investors

Climate Advisers latest policy brief looks at the new U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s proposed climate emissions disclosure rules and how some corporations may not be required to disclose up to 90-83 percent of their estimated total emissions.

The potential gap in disclosure is particularly acute for companies that rely on the  global forest, food, and land sectors. As global food systems are responsible for over one-third of the world’s emissions and 40 percent of US GDP is exposed to climate-related financial risks in sectors exposed to tropical deforestation. Without clarity on the level of emissions associated with companies’ supply …

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Beyond Net Zero: How to Mobilize Passive Investing Towards Paris Alignment With a Focus on the United States

This paper provides a comprehensive and evolving framework for Paris-aligned passive investing, developed through expert consultations, using existing Paris Agreement-related frameworks, taxonomies, data sources, and principles. The framework is then used to analyze existing popular US sustainable funds and EU Paris-Aligned Benchmark funds to see how well they fulfill the criteria, revealing considerable deficiencies in portfolio construction across the board.…

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10 Essentials for a ‘Truly Green’ Green Equity Approach

In 2020, the International Finance Corporation (IFC, the World Bank’s private sector arm) published its “Approach to Greening Equity in Financial Institutions” (Green Equity Approach or GEA). The GEA committed the IFC to end equity investments in financial institutions that do not have a plan to phase out coal-related investments by 2030.

This initiative to “green” equity investments through the GEA was a step in the right direction in helping IFC’s equity financial intermediary clients to stop financing fossil fuels and boost sustainable investments. But while the GEA represents a welcome, if narrow, opportunity to phase out coal financing …

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Looking over the Horizon: The Case for Prioritizing Climate-Related Risk Supervision of Banks

In Looking over the Horizon: The Case for Prioritizing Climate-Related Risk Supervision of Banks, Yevgeny Shrago and David Arkush argue that supervisory oversight of a bank’s safety and soundness is a tool flexible enough to help guard against emerging financial risks posed by climate change—one that can be utilized quickly. Because supervisory guidance is not the product of a formal rulemaking process, it can be deployed with limited administrative delays and avoid pitfalls that impede many legislative and regulatory efforts.…

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Towards a Sustainable Global Construction and Buildings Value Chain

Construction sector accounts for 50% of global resource extraction, making it the most material-intensive sector in the world. This LeadIT  brief adopts a value-chain approach to understand where major challenges and opportunities for sustainability occur, and how these could be shaped through decisions made at different stages.…

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