Ujjayant Chakravorty
Canada Research Chair in Natural Resource Economics
Tier 1 - 2008-10-01
University of Alberta
Social Sciences and Humanities
780-248-1374
Ujjayant@ualberta.ca
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Coming to Canada from
University of Central Florida
Research involves
Examining the effect of environmental regulation on energy use
Research relevance
Studying how regulation will affect the extraction of conventional fossil fuel resources, as well as switching to new sources of energy through changes in relative prices of different energy options
Regulation, Scarcity and Clean Energy Needs
There is a large amount of literature in economics that deals with non-renewable resources that supply the bulk of commercial energy today — namely oil, coal and natural gas. On the other hand, there are various efforts at the regulatory level to limit carbon emissions and control the stock of carbon in the atmosphere.
The research of Canada Research Chair in Natural Resource Economics, Dr. Ujjayant Chakravorty, aims to examine how regulation will affect the extraction of conventional fossil fuel resources, as well as switching to new sources of energy through changes in relative prices of different energy options.
Chakravorty will develop dynamic models of resource use that include “learning by doing” in the adoption of clean technologies, develop simulation models that examine the economic feasibility of alternative energy sources such as nuclear power and biofuels as substitutes for fossil fuel extraction, and examine how clean energy regulation may affect the allocation of land to alternative uses.
Studying alternative energy resources in light of recent policy trends towards limiting carbon concentrations is important because the focus of energy policy has changed in recent decades from a concern over scarcity (which is still very relevant), to a desire for a transition to clean energy. How scarcity and clean energy needs interact and how regulation (international, national or regional) can affect the mix of energy resources that we could use, are issues that are of profound importance to policy makers. These issues are also significant in light of rapid industrialization in the developing world.
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