Dear ESS,
Our next research forum will be held next Wednesday, November 9, 12pm-1:00pm in E40-298. Please join us for lunch and a talk by current PhD student DJ Ramberg (details and upcoming talks below).
Please RSVP by next Monday (Nov 7) at 5pm.
Hope to see you there.
Best, Rebecca & Vivek
Wednesday,November 9, 12pm-1:00pm (E40-298)
Speaker: David J. Ramberg
Title: Sector-Specific General Equilibrium Effects of New Technologies in the Fossil Fuel Complex
Abstract: Congress continues to insist on funding specific energy technologies, despite evidence that market mechanisms produce less expensive outcomes. This is their prerogative. But almost all of the time, they make assessments based on the technology's expected effects in the sector in which it operates. This ignores potential cross-sectorial effects of new technologies. Fortunately, computable general equilibrium models account for the cross-sectorial (general equilibrium) effects. The problem here is that the reported outcomes are in overall dollar amounts and overall emissions effects. And since every model has different numbers for these, and since to laypeople these models are Black Boxes, the advice of CGE modelers is usually ignored because Congress doesn't know what number to believe. The solution is to actually trace the effects of new technology penetration over time and across sectors within the CGE model itself. This provides a narrative as to how the final numbers were calculated by the model. It also sheds insight on how changing the parameters of competition and complementarity across fossil fuel energy inputs (ubiquitous inputs in the economic system) changes how the system itself operates. These dynamics have not traditionally been well explored.
Bio: David "D.J." is a second-year ESD Ph.D. student and TPP '10 graduate. He is an old bastard who's boring because he has a wife and kid. A paper based on his Master's thesis, "The Weak Tie Between Oil and Natural Gas Prices", is set to be published early in 2012 by The Energy Journal. Please come rip up his dissertation proposal before the professors do it in January.
Upcoming Speakers
November 9, 12pm-1:00pm: DJ Ramberg
November 16, 12pm-1:00pm: Candace Brakewood
MONDAY, November 21, 12pm-1:00pm: Regina Clewlow (special day, as part of MIT Open House)
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Rebecca Saari
PhD Student in Engineering Systems
MIT, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139
E19-411-ST9
saarir@mit.edu