Staff:
Stanton, E.A.
;
Bueno, R.
;
Cegan, J.
;
Au, D.
;
Ackerman, F.
Date: 2011-ongoing
Research Area(s):
Climate Economics
Description: In this project, which builds on previous work in Oregon and King County, WA, SEI-US will produce Consumption-Based Emissions Inventory (CBEI) results for San Francisco County and for the State of California. CBEI estimates the total greenhouse gas emissions resulting from all consumption within a study area. For this project, two study areas will be analyzed: (1) the City and County of San Francisco, and (2) the State of California. For this study emissions will be broken down by 1) emissions from households, government and business investments; 2) emissions released within the study area, outside of the study area but within the United States, and in foreign countries; 3) life-cycle phase (production, pre-purchase transportation, wholesale/retail, use, post-consumer disposal); and 4) 400-500 types of consumer goods and services that aggregate to a few dozen subcategories and approximately 15 categories.
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Staff:
Stanton, E.A.
;
Bueno, R.
;
Davis, M.
Date: 2011-ongoing
Client/Funder: SEI Research Innovation Fund (NOVA)
Research Area(s):
Climate Economics
Description: Large-scale climate impacts, with losses in the billions or trillions of dollars, may be hard to visualize. How will climate change affect you as an individual? Using a new methodology, the CIEL model calculates the net gains and losses for typical individuals resulting from a global failure to abate greenhouse-gas emissions. Results are compared for individuals facing low, medium and high damages in high-income and low-income countries. Some of the most important choices that underpin economic assessments of potential climate policies are based not on science, but on normative beliefs; CIEL approaches these choices as important information for policymakers and the public at large, and presents results for multiple values of each key assumption. Case studies will apply CIEL to the Caribbean, which faces extreme climate risks, and to the United States.
More information
Related Publication(s):
Real People, Real Impacts: The Climate Impact Equity Lens
Real People, Real Impacts: The Climate Impact Equity Lens (Policy Brief)
The CIEL Backgrounder: Understanding the Climate Impact Equity Lens
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Staff:
Kartha, S.
;
Kemp-Benedict, E.
Date: 2011-ongoing
Client/Funder: Sida
Research Area(s):
Climate Equity
Description: This project is built on the notion that an equitable framework is a precondition for an effective climate regime. Without developmental justice, it will not be possible to win the earnest engagement of the developing world, which is necessary for a successful global response to the climate problem. This project will continue and extend the work of the ongoing Greenhouse Development Rights project. It aims to instill a perspective of developmental equity into the climate discourse and negotiations, by providing an appropriate framing and the necessary technical, analytical and political substantiation.
More information
External Link
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Staff:
Lee, C.
;
Lazarus, M.
Date: 2011-ongoing
Client/Funder: Natural Resources Defense Council
Research Area(s):
Climate Mitigation Policy
; Emissions Trading & Offsets
Description: Backed by numerous national and global studies, climate and renewable energy experts and advocates have long pointed to biomass energy as offering a potentially significant contribution to long-term, sustainable energy supply. However, in several regions of the United States, proposals to build new biomass power plants have met with stiff opposition, with questions raised regarding the climate benefit of woody biomass energy production. To help address these questions, SEI is developing a spreadsheet tool capable of assessing and clearly presenting the timeline of climate impacts, both GHG emissions and climate-forcing, of using a range of woody biomass sources for electricity production, building upon the foundation of the Land-Use Change Emissions (LUCE) model developed by SEI with NRDC support. Our overall objective with this effort is to develop an educational tool that can inform ongoing biomass energy discussions at both at the government agency level and with civil society at large, and through doing so, achieve greater consensus on the role of U.S. biomass energy in mitigating global climate change.
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Staff:
Lazarus, M.
;
Erickson, P.
;
Chandler, C.
;
AEA (lead), Centre for European Policy Studies, CO2logic
Date: 2011-ongoing
Client/Funder: European Commission Directorate-General for Climate Action, AEA
Research Area(s):
Emissions Trading & Offsets
; Climate Mitigation Policy
Description: SEI is part of a team led by AEA, a global sustainability consultancy, that is providing the European Union with a comprehensive appraisal of the strengths and shortcomings of the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and a suite of practical reform options. We are examining systemic reforms that the EU could promote through changes in CDM governance, rules, and operation as well as unilateral demand-side" steps that the EU, as the principal market for certified emission reductions (CERs), could take to leverage change.
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Staff:
Erickson, P.
;
Lazarus, M.
;
Chandler, C.
;
Varnäs, A.; Nykvist, B.; Nilsson, M. (SEI-Stockholm)
Date: 2011-ongoing
Client/Funder: 3C – Combat Climate Change
Research Area(s):
Climate Mitigation Policy
Description: This study, part of SEI's broader 3C program partnership, focuses on the necessary requirements for key low-carbon technologies to be developed and commercialized; the various structures, policies and other incentives needed to enable this development; as well as the incentives that would spur companies to move to and invest in these new technologies. We focus our study on solar photovoltaic and carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies in the United States and Europe.
More information
External Link
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Staff:
Purkey, D.
;
Forni, L.
;
Joyce, B.
;
Sieber, J.
Date: 2011-ongoing
Research Area(s):
Water Resources
Description: SEI is collaborating with the University of California–Davis to link an agricultural production model based on water valuation for irrigation water, SWAP (State Wide Agricultural Production Model), with SEI's WEAP (Water Evaluation and Planning System). The model is used for an economic assessment of climate change for the entire Central Valley in California under three land changes scenarios of agricultural land based on population growth projections. The outcome of this work is a series of climate change and population projections to 2100.
More information
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Staff:
Ackerman, F.
;
Davis, M.
;
Stanton, E.A.
;
Au, D.
;
Charles Munitz
Date: 2010-ongoing
Client/Funder: E3 Network
Research Area(s):
Climate Economics
Description: The social cost of carbon (SCC), defined as the estimated price of the damages caused by each additional ton of CO2 released into the atmosphere, is the volume dial on government regulations affecting greenhouse gases: The higher the SCC is set, the more stringent the regulatory standards. It is used in cost-benefit analyses of proposed rules by EPA and other regulatory agencies. This project builds on our 2010 critique of the federal government process that recommended a low value of $21 per ton of CO2; our follow-up analysis looks at two of the models used to come up with that estimate, FUND and DICE. We will also recalculate the SCC, using the methods of the federal government's analysis but incorporating a full range of climate risks and uncertainties.
Related Publication(s):
Climate damages in the FUND model: A disaggregated analysis
Damage Estimates and the Social Cost of Carbon: The Need for Change
The Social Cost of Carbon
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Staff:
Ackerman, F.
;
Stanton, E.A.
;
Davis, M.
Date: 2010-ongoing
Research Area(s):
Climate Economics
Description: Despite oceans' enormous importance, scant attention has been given to them in climate policy. We now realize oceans face several threats, including rising temperatures, acidification, pollution, and large regions that have become anoxic. Coastal areas are also threatened by sea-level rise. This project, part of an international, multi-disciplinary effort led by SEI, takes a holistic approach to those issues and provides estimates of their economic impacts and implications. Our research will examine the economic cost of climate impacts on marine fishing, tourism and recreation, coastal property and infrastructure, and other industries.
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Staff:
Purkey, D.
;
Fencl, A.
;
RAND Corporation; Hazen and Sawyer
Date: 2010-ongoing
Client/Funder: Water Research Foundation
Research Area(s):
Water Resources
Description: Climate change adds a layer of complexity to the already substantial challenges facing water utility managers. As future conditions become increasingly uncertain, decision processes responding to these changes are necessarily evolving away from a deterministic prediction-based paradigm to one based on vulnerability identification and adaptation planning. SEI is developing a risk assessment and management framework for water utilities to help them learn about potential climate impacts and how these affect decision-making and planning. The framework will be piloted for the New York City water supply system and with the Colorado Springs Utilities in 2011.
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Staff:
Purkey, D.
;
Joyce, B.
;
Sieber, J.
;
Heaps, C.
;
National Center for Atmospheric Research; Pacific Gas and Electric Company; Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Date: 2010-ongoing
Client/Funder: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA); California Energy Commission (CEC)
Research Area(s):
Water Resources
; Energy Modeling
Description: This project continues to link SEI's Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) and Long-range Energy Alternatives Planning (LEAP) systems to build an integrated platform to explore water and energy interactions and feedbacks. In California, it is estimated that nearly 20% of all energy is associated with moving, lifting, treating, and using water. For this project, SEI has partnered with the state Department of Water Resources, which is responsible for guiding California's water future; the California Energy Commission, the coordinating agency to address climate change and reduce greenhouse emissions; and the Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E),which provides natural gas and electric service to millions in northern and central California. We will link water management options, such as reuse, reservoir re-operation, demand-side management, land use changes, etc., as represented in the WEAP portion of the tool, to models of the electric utility serving the water utilities, as represented in LEAP. In addition to a new decision support tool, the results of this case study will be used to develop a final report on the Northern California's water future and its implications for energy demands.
External Link
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Staff:
Purkey, D.
;
Forni, L.
;
University of California–Davis
Date: 2010-ongoing
Client/Funder: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation
Research Area(s):
Water Resources
Description: SEI, in collaboration with University of California–Davis, is developing a link between the WEAP application for the Sacramento Basin, San Joaquin Valley and the Tulare Lake hydrology and SWAP, the State Wide Agricultural Production model for the Central Valley. The study dynamically simulates the relationships between water supply and land use management decisions under a number of climate change scenarios.
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Staff:
Purkey, D.
;
Sieber, J.
;
Kemp-Benedict, E.
;
Joyce, B.
;
Huber-Lee, A.
Date: 2009-ongoing
Client/Funder: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Research Area(s):
Water Resources
Description: SEI worked with academic partners to link an economic optimization model, MYWAS, developed for a key region of the Middle East to a WEAP application of the same geography. MYWAS stands for "Multi-Year Water Allocation System" and was written in GAMS, the General Algebraic Modeling System. This project included making major modifications to WEAP.
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Staff:
Purkey, D.
;
Mehta, V.
;
RAND Corporation; El Dorado Irrigation District
Date: 2009-ongoing
Client/Funder: California Energy Commission
Research Area(s):
Water Resources
; Sustainable Futures
Description: As part of continued collaboration with the El Dorado Irrigation District initiated under the NOAA project, SEI is working with partners to implement a planning process leading to the development of a legislatively mandated Urban Water Management Plan that takes consideration of uncertainties facing EID. In addition to considering climate and socio-economic uncertainty, SEI will integrate changing risks of catastrophic wildfire on watershed hydrology into the EID WEAP application.
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Staff:
Young, C.
;
Flores, F.
;
National Center for Atmospheric Research; CH2M Hill
Date: 2009-ongoing
Client/Funder: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation
Research Area(s):
Water Resources
Description: The effects of climate change on California's agricultural crop water demand in the coming century are not yet well understood. In this project we use a simulation model to study the various effects of climate change on crop water demand. The physical processes simulated include the reduction in vapor loss due to stomatal closure, the effects of CO2 fertilization on canopy development, changes in growing season timing and length, and the effects of increased temperature on crop water demand.
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