VALENTINA BOSETTI

What is RISICO about?

RISICO is a 5 years ERC Starting Grant (2014-2019) .

Uncertainty is pervasive in all aspects of climate change. Although this is beyond dispute, the vast majority of research assessing climate ignores uncertainty, in large part because of the technical complexities involved. The present project aims at advancing substantially the way we conceptualize, model and frame the climate change policy making process, focusing on the central role of uncertainty.

The first step is that of applying state of the art techniques from operation research (stochastic dynamic and approximate dynamic programming) to the realm of integrated assessment models (the conventional tool used to perform climate change analysis). These techniques enable us to capture a wide range of stochastic phenomena in the decision process. However, to really move forward the research edge one needs to shift the focus on to the way we, as individuals, perceive these uncertain phenomena.  

Indeed, the literature on decision making under uncertainty spans way beyond economics, statistics and operations research: Notably psychology and philosophy. These disciplines have had a major role in extending what we know about the process of decision making under uncertainty, and this project aims at reconciling this strand of literature with that on climate change policy design and assessment. The three main research questions are:

1) What are key risk and uncertainty perception issues and “biases” when we face climate change and under what instances should they be included in normative analyses of climate change?

2) How can we map these “alternative” representations of uncertainty and risk perception into integrated assessment models and how will these affect the normative predicaments of these models ?

3) How can we communicate and frame uncertainty itself, as well as results of stochastic analyses, in a way that help us reducing those biases that have no normative role, but arise from our limited attentional and information processing capacity? 

People

Ning Liu
Ilke Aydogan
Anna Abatayo
Stergios Athanasoglou
Silvia Pianta
Loic Berger
Matt Sisco
Soheil Shayeg

PUBLICATIONS

Lamperti, F. Bosetti, V. Roventini, A. Tavoni, M., 2019 The public costs of climate-induced financial instability, Nature Climate Change, Forthcoming

Johannes Emmerling, Laurent Drouet, Kaj van der Wijst, Detlef van Vuuren, Valentina Bosetti, and Massimo Tavoni, 2019, The role of the discount rate for emission pathways and negative emissions, Environmental Research Letters, Forthcoming

Ho Emily, David Budescu, Valentina Bosetti, Detlef van Vuuren and Klaus Keller, 2019, Not all carbon dioxide emissions scenarios are equally likely: A subjective expert assessment, Climatic Change Forthcoming

Loic Berger and Valentina Bosetti, 2019, Are policymakers ambiguity averse?, The Economic Journal Accepted

Gillingham, K. W. D. Nordhaus, D. Anthoff, V. Bosetti, G. Blanford, P. Christensen, H. McJeon, J. Reilly, P. Sztorc (2018),  Modeling Uncertainty in the Integrated Assessment of Climate Change: A Multi-Model Comparison, JAERE, volume 5, number 4.

Verdolini, E., L. D. Anadón, E. Baker, V. Bosetti, L. A. Reis, (2018), 'The Future Prospects of Energy Technologies: Insights from Expert Elicitations', REEP Forthcoming

Diaz Anadon, L., E. Baker, V. Bosetti (2017) Integrating uncertainty into public energy research and development decisions Nature Energy 2, 17071, DOI: 10.1038/nenergy.2017.71

Adler, M, D Anthoff, V Bosetti, G Garner, K Keller, and N Treich, 2017, Priority For The Worse Off And The Social Cost Of Carbon, Nature Climate Change, DOI: 10.1038/nclimate3298

Bosetti, V., E. Weber, L. Berger, D. Budescu, N. Liu, M. Tavoni (2017) COP21 Climate Negotiators’ Responses to Climate Model Forecasts, Nature Climate Change, 7, 185-189,

Marangoni, G. M. Tavoni, V. Bosetti, E. Borgonovo, et al. (2017) Sensitivity of projected long-term CO2 emissions across the Shared Socio-economic Pathways, Nature Climate Change, 7, 113–117

Bosetti, V., M. Heugues, A. Tavoni, (2017) Luring others into climate action: Coalition formation games with threshold and spillover effects, Oxford Economic Paper, Forthcoming

Matthew R. Sisco, Valentina Bosetti, Elke U. Weber (2017), When do extreme weather events generate attention to climate change?, forthcoming Climatic Change, DOI: 10.1007/s10584-017-1984-2

Bosetti, V., M. Heugues, A. Tavoni, (2017) Luring others into climate action: Coalition formation games with threshold and spillover effects, Oxford Economic Paper, 69(2), 2017, 410–431

Verdolini, E. and Bosetti V., (2017) Environmental Policy and the International Diffusion of Cleaner Technologies for Power, Environmental and Resource Economics, March 2017, Volume 66, Issue 3, pp 497–536

Drouet, L., V. Bosetti, M. Tavoni (2015), Selection of climate policies under the uncertainties outlined in IPCC AR5, Nature Climate Change 5, 937–940 (2015)