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The Role of Integrated Assessment Models in Climate Policy: A User's Guide and Assessment

Author

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  • Gilbert E. Metcalf
  • James Stock

Abstract

This paper considers the role of integrated assessment models (IAMs) in the construction of climate policy. We focus on questions involving the role of IAMs in estimating the social cost of carbon (SCC), how best to handle the considerable scientific uncertainty underlying the IAMs from the perspective of judgement or another substitute. The perspective we adopt in tackling these questions is rooted in the specific needs of the existing U.S. institutions responsible for making and implementing climate policy, specifically regulatory agencies within the Executive Branch and Congress should it choose to take up climate legislation. Our discussion has three premises. First, policy makers need a numerical value and an uncertainty range for the SCC for policy evaluation and implementation. Second, whatever the true value of the SCC is, it is not zero. Third, considerable uncertainty surrounds the current state of scientific knowledge about the current and future costs of climate change. The evolving nature of the science and the ultimate goal of informing first-best policy suggests to us that the official SCC-the SCC used for regulatory analysis by the U.S. government--should not be thought of as a single number or even a range of numbers, but more broadly as a process that yields updated estimates of those numbers and ranges. Viewed in this way, the ultimate goal of the process is scientific credibility, public acceptance, and political and legal viability.

Suggested Citation

  • Gilbert E. Metcalf & James Stock, 2015. "The Role of Integrated Assessment Models in Climate Policy: A User's Guide and Assessment," Discussion Papers Series, Department of Economics, Tufts University 0811, Department of Economics, Tufts University.
  • Handle: RePEc:tuf:tuftec:0811
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    File URL: http://ase.tufts.edu/economics/documents/papers/2015/metcalfRoleOfIntegrated.pdf
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    Cited by:

    1. Pamela McElwee, 2021. "Anthropological engagements with integrated assessment modeling," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 8(1), pages 168-171, January.
    2. J. Farmer & Cameron Hepburn & Penny Mealy & Alexander Teytelboym, 2015. "A Third Wave in the Economics of Climate Change," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 62(2), pages 329-357, October.
    3. Besley, Tim & Dixit, Avinash K., 2017. "Comparing Alternative Policies Against Environmental Catastrophes," CEPR Discussion Papers 11802, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Vafa Anvari & Channing Arndt & Faaiqa Hartley & Konstantin Makrelov & Kenneth Strezepek & Tim Thomas & Sherwin Gabriel & Bruno Merven, 2022. "AclimatechangemodellingframeworkforfinancialstresstestinginSouthernAfrica," Working Papers 11030, South African Reserve Bank.
    5. Matthew J. Kotchen, 2018. "Which Social Cost of Carbon? A Theoretical Perspective," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 5(3), pages 673-694.
    6. Xi Xie & Yuwei Weng & Wenjia Cai, 2018. "Co-Benefits of CO 2 Mitigation for NO X Emission Reduction: A Research Based on the DICE Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-18, April.
    7. Mizrach Bruce, 2015. "A video interview of James Stock," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 19(4), pages 393-395, September.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Climate Change; Social Cost of Carbon; Integrated Assessment Models; Climate Policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming
    • Q58 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environmental Economics: Government Policy

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