Assessing Climate TransItion OptioNs: policy vs impacts

ended

ACTION project aims at enhancing transparency and comparability among countries’ climate change policies while offering insights into a fair and just transition toward the sustainable development. The Paris Agreement, adopted at the end of 2015, affirms the urgency to tackle climate change and foster a climate-resilient and inclusive low-carbon development. The pledge-and-review approach launched by the Agreement requires more than 190 States to periodically update their climate plans toward more ambitious actions. This calls for new systematic tools to track countries’ commitment toward the achievement of global objectives (i.e. limiting the average temperature increase well below 2°C) as well as for a comparison, which considers synergies and adverse impacts arising from national specificities. Falling at the intersection of public policy, climate change economics and climate science, ACTION will develop a quantitative approach to empirically evaluate national climate policies in terms of stringency, determinants, and economic impacts. By assessing the effectiveness of current measures and by identifying successful elements and obstacles, ACTION will support the EU and its Member States to better design their future climate agenda. ACTION will be hosted in two highly qualified institutions: during the outgoing phase (24 months) at Harvard University, under the guidance of Prof. Aldy, and during the incoming phase (12 months) at Ca’Foscari University under the supervision of Prof. De Cian.