Curriculum The Economics of Climate Change
The Economics of Climate Change
Climate change as the greatest market failure - discounting the future, climate models, tipping points, net zero, carbon budgets, climate finance, negotiations and fairness.
- Climate Change: The Greatest Market Failure Why economists describe climate change as a market failure on an unprecedented scale, and what makes it so hard to solve. 📄 Read-aloud
- Discounting the Future: Stern vs Nordhaus How the choice of discount rate shapes how much we should spend now to avoid climate damage in the future, and the famous debate between two economists. 📄 Read-aloud
- Integrated Assessment Models How economists build models linking the economy, emissions and climate to estimate the best climate policy, and the criticisms of these models. 📄 Read-aloud
- Tipping Points and Fat Tails Why the risk of extreme, irreversible climate outcomes matters greatly for policy, and Martin Weitzman's argument about catastrophic uncertainty. 📄 Read-aloud
- What Net Zero Means What net zero emissions targets mean, why they became the global goal, and how countries and companies plan to reach them. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Carbon Budget How scientists calculate how much more carbon dioxide the world can emit while keeping warming below set limits, and why the budget is running out. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Economics of Climate Change: Checkpoint 1 Quick checkpoint - five questions on market failure, discounting, models, tipping points, net zero and carbon budgets. 5 questions
- Climate Finance: Who Pays? How money flows to help developing countries cut emissions and adapt, the promises rich countries made, and the debate over whether they are enough. 📄 Read-aloud
- How Climate Negotiations Work How nearly every country negotiates climate action through annual UN conferences, what the Paris Agreement requires, and why agreements are so difficult. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Free-Rider Problem and Climate Clubs Why voluntary climate agreements struggle with free-riding, and William Nordhaus's idea of climate clubs that penalise non-members. 📄 Read-aloud
- Stranded Assets and the Carbon Bubble How fossil fuel reserves, power plants and other assets could lose value as the world shifts to clean energy, and why investors and regulators care. 📄 Read-aloud
- Carbon Offsets and Carbon Removal How carbon offsets are supposed to work, why many have been criticised, and the role of technologies and nature in removing carbon from the air. 📄 Read-aloud
- Climate Change and Inequality How emissions are unequally distributed between rich and poor, and how climate impacts fall hardest on those who contributed least. 📄 Read-aloud