‘Energy and environmental policies are typically addressed by different departments of government, and by different Directorates General in the case of the European Commission. The result is that policy frameworks, models and values develop in parallel and this in turn can result in diverging policy recommendations, and actions that are often not mutually consistent. An important integrative force in the European Union (EU) has been the creation of the EU emissions trading scheme which links the planet’s scarcity of assimilative capacity for greenhouse gas emissions directly to the market that shapes decisions by producers and consumers of energy. It is necessary that the intellectual community be untrammelled by such territorial institutional or political considerations, and look at the choices and issues holistically with the focus on the well being of society as a whole. This book is an important contribution in this regard as it sets the stage, addresses the role and potential of emissions trading, and then focuses on more speculative arenas of policy and practise. As such is provides both policy practitioners and the intellectual community with plenty of substance to be informed by, and to argue about.’ – Frank J. Convery, University College Dublin, Ireland

‘The papers on emissions trading in this book focus on one of the most radical innovations in environmental policy in recent years, the European Union’s emissions trading scheme. This harnesses the power of the market to stimulate the massive investments, changes in patterns of energy use and technological innovations needed for sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Economic research can make an important contribution to understanding some of the critical issues in the design, implementation and effectiveness of this scheme, and the papers in this book bring together key contributions from some of the leading researchers in this area.’ – Stephen Smith, University College London, UK

‘This volume contains a coherent collection of economic papers on climate change and energy policy, written by well-known scholars in the field. The book offers interesting reviews of the relevant theoretical literature on economic growth and on permit trading. It provides an original in-depth treatment of the new EU CO2-emission trading system, addressing equity issues as well as the impact on growth and innovation. And the relationship between energy policy and endogenous energy saving technical progress is also studied in more general contexts.’ – Cees Withagen, Free University Amsterdam and Tilburg University, The Netherlands

Climate change and energy consumption are at the forefront of current environmental debate. While energy is essential to the functioning and survival of our societies, the environmental impact that energy consumption is having, particularly on climate change, is a growing concern and the design and practicalities of energy and energy-related environmental policies are under constant scrutiny. This innovative new book not only addresses the economic assessment of environmental and energy policies but also discusses the efficiency and distributional consequences these policies have for producers and consumers.

With contributions from leading academics in the field, this comprehensive volume uses a variety of methodological approaches with which to explore a number of pertinent issues, including several studies on the EU Emission Trading System, as well as more advanced topics such as indeterminacy and optimal environmental public policies, energy-saving technological progress, oil shocks and energy transitions and policy design. Combining theoretical and empirical work, this timely book is a significant contribution to the existing literature and deals with issues at the frontier of current economic knowledge.