Climate Policy Design Under Uncertainty

William Pizer

RFF Working Paper Series from Resources for the Future

Abstract: The uncertainty surrounding both costs and benefits associated with global climate change mitigation creates enormous hurdles for scientists, stakeholders, and decisionmakers. A key issue is how policy choices balance uncertainty about costs and benefits. This balance arises in terms of the time path of mitigation efforts as well as whether those efforts, by design, focus on effort or outcome. This paper considers two choices—price versus quantity controls and absolute versus relative/intensity emissions limits—demonstrating that price controls and intensity emissions limits favor certainty about cost over climate benefits and future emissions reductions. The paper then argues that in the near term, this favoritism is desired.

Keywords: carbon; climate; policy; intensity; global warming; uncertainty; price; quantity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D81 Q54 Q58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005-10-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene and nep-env
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

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Working Paper: Climate Policy Design under Uncertainty (2005)
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