Energy

583 Items

Analysis & Opinions - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Event Debrief: Bezos Earth Fund's Leon Clarke Says Economic Thinking on Climate Action Must Evolve

| Dec. 21, 2023

Harvard Kennedy School hosted Leon Clarke, Director of Decarbonization Pathways at Bezos Earth Fund, for an Energy Policy Seminar to discuss the economic challenges that are slowing the pace of the energy transition.

Audio - Harvard Environmental Economics Program

The Challenges Facing the Nation's Electricity Power Sector: A Conversation with Severin Borenstein

| Sep. 08, 2023

Energy economist Severin Borenstein, Professor of the Graduate School at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley, discussed the many significant challenges facing the nation’s electricity power sector in the latest episode of “Environmental Insights: Discussions on Policy and Practice from the Harvard Environmental Economics Program.

Audio - Harvard Environmental Economics Program

The Regulatory and 'Just Transition' Dynamics of Climate Policy: A Conversation with Meredith Fowlie

| July 06, 2023

Resource economist UC Berkeley Professor Meredith Fowlie spoke about the complex regulatory challenges and ‘just transition’ dynamics of climate policy in the latest episode of “Environmental Insights: Discussions on Policy and Practice from the Harvard Environmental Economics Program.” 

Analysis & Opinions - Hoover Institution Press

China Brokers Diplomacy Between Iran and Saudi Arabia: Implications for the US Role in the Middle East

| Mar. 23, 2023

For over a decade, American officials have been touting the wisdom of a strategic “pivot” away from the Middle East in order to face the threat of a rising China. During that same period, Beijing has identified the Middle East as a primary arena for great power competition with the United States. 

Electricians install solar panels.

AP/Mary Altaffer

Report Chapter - Brookings Institution

Mexico’s Energy Reforms: A Blow to Realizing the Most Competitive and Dynamic Region in the World

| Feb. 28, 2022

In late 2017, Mexico made headlines as Italian company Enel bid what was then a world-record low price for renewable energy in the country’s third such energy auction. This development was possible due to the historical and sweeping energy reforms passed with broad support in Mexico in 2013. Then-President Enrique Peña Nieto had succeeded where previous Mexican presidents had failed, reversing decades of resource nationalism and overhauling the energy sector through constitutional reforms that gave the private sector a larger role and advantaged renewable energy in Mexico’s economy. The 2017 auction seemed to indicate Mexico’s bright future not only as a conventional oil producer, but also as a clean energy power.

Workers stand on a platform at a Saudi Aramco oil separator processing facility in Abqaiq, near Dammam, Sept. 20, 2019.

AP Photo/Amr Nabil

Paper

Reversal of Fortune for Political Incumbents after Oil Shocks

    Authors:
  • Simeon Djankov
  • Ha Nguyen
  • Ivan Yotzov
| March 2021

This paper explores the effect of oil shocks on electoral outcomes. Using a new polling and election data set for 207 elections across 50 democracies, the paper shows that oil price increases systematically lower the odds of reelection for incumbents. The analysis verifies that these shocks—which reduce consumption growth—are associated with worsening performance for incumbents in the runup to reelection and a reversal in the leaning of the political party in power post-election.