Thomas Heller - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Thomas Heller
Climate Change 2007, 2000
... domain of inquiry but rather an open and evolv-ing conversation in which voices from many dis... more ... domain of inquiry but rather an open and evolv-ing conversation in which voices from many disciplines work out shared views and differences in a common labor of edification. The concept of individuality, in relation to the historical phenomenon of "individualism," seemed an ...
China's long-term energy policy has emphasized energy security and promoted coal and hydropow... more China's long-term energy policy has emphasized energy security and promoted coal and hydropower, the two main indigenous energy resources. The electricity industry is for the most part coal-based as a result. Coal accounted for 86% of installed capacity in 1953 and 74% in 2000. Hydropower constituted 14% and 25% in the respective years. Nuclear power became a part of the
International Environmental Agreements on Climate Change, 1999
Le opinioni espresse nel presente lavoro non rappresentano necessariamente la posizione della Fon... more Le opinioni espresse nel presente lavoro non rappresentano necessariamente la posizione della Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei SUMMARY Stabilization of greenhouse gases at sustainable levels is the objective of the FCCC. Strategies to achieve this aim have been the object of intense debate. This paper focuses on one emissions trading system under scrutiny, Joint Implementation (JI). The basic premise of JI is that one nation party can satisfy its obligations to control emissions by financing emission mitigation in another nation party. Such an approach can optimize access to least cost mitigation options, and predicts collective participation even in the absence of centralized determination of universal quotas. A key issue for JI is the concept of additionality. "Business as usual" trajectories provide a baseline against which additionality is measured. Accurate estimation of baselines needs to take into proper account institutional and organizational transaction costs. Hence, the implementation of a climate change system incorporating JI as a core element requires a greater understanding of the incentives and barriers that underlie the patterns of infrastructure development in rapidly growing economies. Readers should note that all of this paper's analyses and conclusions related to JI apply equally to the new clean development mechanism established by article 12 of the Kyoto protocol. Opposition to JI is primarily based on the concern that JI baselines could be set at excessively permissive levels. Such concern, however, relies on analyses that often do not take into proper account transaction costs or barriers. Transaction costs, such as institutional costs arising because of existing policies and organizational costs arising because of restructuring, are typically hard to quantify. But failure to incorporate them in models used to define JI baselines will lead to incorrect emission abatement predictions. The inclusion of transaction, as well as production, costs in modeling is thus critical to the optimal definition of additionality. It is also important to consider policy baselines that encourage sound environmental and economic policy and that prevent backsliding on institutional reforms that might otherwise have been forthcoming. In conclusion, in order to implement cost effective climate change systems incorporating JI as a core element, it will first be necessary to understand better the patterns of infrastructure development in rapidly growing economies, and particularly the incentives and barriers that underlie these patterns. Because of the central importance of China in any climate change strategy, the author suggests exploring these issues using case studies of Chinese sectors with emission mitigation potential. Readers should note that all of this paper's analyses and conclusions related to JI apply equally to the new clean development mechanism established by article 12 of the Kyoto protocol.
Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies, 1996
Professor Heller's article discusses why there has been little progress after the Rio Earth Summi... more Professor Heller's article discusses why there has been little progress after the Rio Earth Summit in developing the Framework Convention on Climate Change. He argues that, beyond the scientific uncertainties about climate change and its economic impacts, agreement on the legal structure of a comprehensive regime has been hampered by institutional factors. These include: the political discounting of damage to future populations, the diverse risks of global warming in different regions, and the distrust in many nations with market instruments, like taxes or tradable permits, that are favored by many industrial nations dependent on fossil fuels. Resolving these problems will be particularly difficult in multilateral negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations. This is due to the conflation of environmental issues with a broader, contested agenda of North-South issues. Unless this impasse is overcome in the near term, key nations, essential to a successful mitigation regime, may abandon collective solutions and invest in local adaptations to climate change. Heller argues that Joint Implementation (JI), a type of tradable permit system, can help to break this deadlock. However, investment in JIprojects has been slow due to political opposition and to confusion about the nature of an international market in environmental services. The article concludes with an outline for the development of a JI market that does not require a prior multilateral consensus.
Bibliography African National Congress, Reconstruction and development program. Johannesburg: Uma... more Bibliography African National Congress, Reconstruction and development program. Johannesburg: Umanyano Publications. 1994. Agrawala, P., Personal Discussions, R. Tongia, Editor. 2003. Ahluwalia, MS, Report Of The Expert Group (on) Settlement Of SEB ...
The Experiences of Five Major Developing Countries, 2007
Creating More Effective Strategies for Protecting the Planet, 2009
Creating More Effective Strategies for Protecting the Planet, 2009
The Experiences of Five Major Developing Countries, 2007
To power national development, the government organized electricity production and distribution a... more To power national development, the government organized electricity production and distribution as a state-owned vertically integrated utility, structured and operated under central planning. Electricity was supplied on the basis of political priority instead of cost, and the single party authority ensured that national economic, technical and social policies were implemented by managers at all levels of the industry. This study
Energy Policy, 2005
A difficult and persistent issue in the discussion of Clean Development Mechanism is estimating a... more A difficult and persistent issue in the discussion of Clean Development Mechanism is estimating a carbon emissions baseline, against which tradable permits may be certified. This paper examines the proposition of adopting sectoral, as opposed to project level, baselines by conducting case studies of the electricity industry in three Chinese provinces. We find that complicated central planning, financial and institutional
Economic Affairs, 2006
"Despite periodic rises in commodity prices, resource-rich African countries hav... more "Despite periodic rises in commodity prices, resource-rich African countries have been characterised by state failure and low long-term economic growth. Competing explanations for the resource curse are examined with a particular focus on political institutions. The effective privatisation of states is considered within an alternative theoretical framework of non-democratic governance and non-market economics. Given the nature of many African governments,
Canadian Journal of Law and Society, 2005
Beyond Common Knowledge: Empirical Approaches to the Rule of Law Stanford: Stanford University Pr... more Beyond Common Knowledge: Empirical Approaches to the Rule of Law Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003, viii, 435 pages "Make yourself a stranger!" I recall those words clearly almost 40 years after they were uttered by my professor of comparative law. The message was twofold you can never know the other if you remain anchored in your own habits of thought and blind to your assumptions; just as importantly, you can never know yourself if you cannot know the other. Beyond Common Knowledge is primarily located within the first of these aspirations, but its message equally speaks to the second. The various authors of this collection are interested in one aspect of what Harry Arthurs calls the "globalization of the mind". They observe that there is an intensive global search for the "rule of law", the holy grail of good governance. This quest has led to wholesale exportation of western concepts of legality and judicial practice. But the authors enter a cautionary note about two large gaps that afflict thinking in this field. The first of these is the gap between theory and practice: between the ambitious programmes traced by the IMF, World Bank, NGOs and assorted do-gooders who think that they will lead to good governance (and its attendant economic prosperity), and the facts on the ground. The second, and more insidious because less visible, is the gap between the stated goals of individual programmes (what might be called "the practice in theory") sponsored by these organizations, and the actual activities (what might be called "the theory in practice") that are being funded. In brief, the authors conclude that we don't know what "rule of law" programmes are actually working, and we don't know why individual programmes succeed or fail. More troubling, we don't even really know what it means for a programme to succeed or fail. Most serious of all, we don't know how to design empirical studies of these issues, to frame questions and hypotheses that can be tested, and to carry out the research entailed by these hypotheses. Of course, answering all the issues raised in the preceding paragraph would require time, resources and coordination beyond the capacity of all but the most lavishly funded agencies and research teams. Hence the editors have set themselves a narrower task. They wish to focus on "rule of law" proposals that have as a target judicial reform. The collection comprises an Introduction and 11 chapters, four of which raise theoretical concerns, and six of which consider the empirical evidence from India, China, Chile and Mexico. The remaining essay considers general themes, but restricts its coverage to Latin America. At page three of the Introduction, the editors state: (…) at the very least, the chapters here encourage critical thinking about rule-of-law programs. A cautionary story that threads its way
Program for …, 2004
The Program on Energy and Sustainable Development at Stanford University is an interdisciplinary ... more The Program on Energy and Sustainable Development at Stanford University is an interdisciplinary research program focused on the economic and environmental consequences of global energy consumption. Its studies examine the development of global natural gas markets, reform ...
Beyond Kyoto: Advancing the international …, 2003
Page 1. BEYOND KYOTO: ADVANCING THE INTERNATIONAL EFFORT AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE WORKING DRAFT JUL... more Page 1. BEYOND KYOTO: ADVANCING THE INTERNATIONAL EFFORT AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE WORKING DRAFT JULY 2003 DEVELOPMENT AND CLIMATE: ENGAGING DEVELOPING COUNTRIES THOMAS C. HELLER P.R. SHUKLA ...
Climate Change 2007, 2000
... domain of inquiry but rather an open and evolv-ing conversation in which voices from many dis... more ... domain of inquiry but rather an open and evolv-ing conversation in which voices from many disciplines work out shared views and differences in a common labor of edification. The concept of individuality, in relation to the historical phenomenon of "individualism," seemed an ...
China's long-term energy policy has emphasized energy security and promoted coal and hydropow... more China's long-term energy policy has emphasized energy security and promoted coal and hydropower, the two main indigenous energy resources. The electricity industry is for the most part coal-based as a result. Coal accounted for 86% of installed capacity in 1953 and 74% in 2000. Hydropower constituted 14% and 25% in the respective years. Nuclear power became a part of the
International Environmental Agreements on Climate Change, 1999
Le opinioni espresse nel presente lavoro non rappresentano necessariamente la posizione della Fon... more Le opinioni espresse nel presente lavoro non rappresentano necessariamente la posizione della Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei SUMMARY Stabilization of greenhouse gases at sustainable levels is the objective of the FCCC. Strategies to achieve this aim have been the object of intense debate. This paper focuses on one emissions trading system under scrutiny, Joint Implementation (JI). The basic premise of JI is that one nation party can satisfy its obligations to control emissions by financing emission mitigation in another nation party. Such an approach can optimize access to least cost mitigation options, and predicts collective participation even in the absence of centralized determination of universal quotas. A key issue for JI is the concept of additionality. "Business as usual" trajectories provide a baseline against which additionality is measured. Accurate estimation of baselines needs to take into proper account institutional and organizational transaction costs. Hence, the implementation of a climate change system incorporating JI as a core element requires a greater understanding of the incentives and barriers that underlie the patterns of infrastructure development in rapidly growing economies. Readers should note that all of this paper's analyses and conclusions related to JI apply equally to the new clean development mechanism established by article 12 of the Kyoto protocol. Opposition to JI is primarily based on the concern that JI baselines could be set at excessively permissive levels. Such concern, however, relies on analyses that often do not take into proper account transaction costs or barriers. Transaction costs, such as institutional costs arising because of existing policies and organizational costs arising because of restructuring, are typically hard to quantify. But failure to incorporate them in models used to define JI baselines will lead to incorrect emission abatement predictions. The inclusion of transaction, as well as production, costs in modeling is thus critical to the optimal definition of additionality. It is also important to consider policy baselines that encourage sound environmental and economic policy and that prevent backsliding on institutional reforms that might otherwise have been forthcoming. In conclusion, in order to implement cost effective climate change systems incorporating JI as a core element, it will first be necessary to understand better the patterns of infrastructure development in rapidly growing economies, and particularly the incentives and barriers that underlie these patterns. Because of the central importance of China in any climate change strategy, the author suggests exploring these issues using case studies of Chinese sectors with emission mitigation potential. Readers should note that all of this paper's analyses and conclusions related to JI apply equally to the new clean development mechanism established by article 12 of the Kyoto protocol.
Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies, 1996
Professor Heller's article discusses why there has been little progress after the Rio Earth Summi... more Professor Heller's article discusses why there has been little progress after the Rio Earth Summit in developing the Framework Convention on Climate Change. He argues that, beyond the scientific uncertainties about climate change and its economic impacts, agreement on the legal structure of a comprehensive regime has been hampered by institutional factors. These include: the political discounting of damage to future populations, the diverse risks of global warming in different regions, and the distrust in many nations with market instruments, like taxes or tradable permits, that are favored by many industrial nations dependent on fossil fuels. Resolving these problems will be particularly difficult in multilateral negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations. This is due to the conflation of environmental issues with a broader, contested agenda of North-South issues. Unless this impasse is overcome in the near term, key nations, essential to a successful mitigation regime, may abandon collective solutions and invest in local adaptations to climate change. Heller argues that Joint Implementation (JI), a type of tradable permit system, can help to break this deadlock. However, investment in JIprojects has been slow due to political opposition and to confusion about the nature of an international market in environmental services. The article concludes with an outline for the development of a JI market that does not require a prior multilateral consensus.
Bibliography African National Congress, Reconstruction and development program. Johannesburg: Uma... more Bibliography African National Congress, Reconstruction and development program. Johannesburg: Umanyano Publications. 1994. Agrawala, P., Personal Discussions, R. Tongia, Editor. 2003. Ahluwalia, MS, Report Of The Expert Group (on) Settlement Of SEB ...
The Experiences of Five Major Developing Countries, 2007
Creating More Effective Strategies for Protecting the Planet, 2009
Creating More Effective Strategies for Protecting the Planet, 2009
The Experiences of Five Major Developing Countries, 2007
To power national development, the government organized electricity production and distribution a... more To power national development, the government organized electricity production and distribution as a state-owned vertically integrated utility, structured and operated under central planning. Electricity was supplied on the basis of political priority instead of cost, and the single party authority ensured that national economic, technical and social policies were implemented by managers at all levels of the industry. This study
Energy Policy, 2005
A difficult and persistent issue in the discussion of Clean Development Mechanism is estimating a... more A difficult and persistent issue in the discussion of Clean Development Mechanism is estimating a carbon emissions baseline, against which tradable permits may be certified. This paper examines the proposition of adopting sectoral, as opposed to project level, baselines by conducting case studies of the electricity industry in three Chinese provinces. We find that complicated central planning, financial and institutional
Economic Affairs, 2006
"Despite periodic rises in commodity prices, resource-rich African countries hav... more "Despite periodic rises in commodity prices, resource-rich African countries have been characterised by state failure and low long-term economic growth. Competing explanations for the resource curse are examined with a particular focus on political institutions. The effective privatisation of states is considered within an alternative theoretical framework of non-democratic governance and non-market economics. Given the nature of many African governments,
Canadian Journal of Law and Society, 2005
Beyond Common Knowledge: Empirical Approaches to the Rule of Law Stanford: Stanford University Pr... more Beyond Common Knowledge: Empirical Approaches to the Rule of Law Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003, viii, 435 pages "Make yourself a stranger!" I recall those words clearly almost 40 years after they were uttered by my professor of comparative law. The message was twofold you can never know the other if you remain anchored in your own habits of thought and blind to your assumptions; just as importantly, you can never know yourself if you cannot know the other. Beyond Common Knowledge is primarily located within the first of these aspirations, but its message equally speaks to the second. The various authors of this collection are interested in one aspect of what Harry Arthurs calls the "globalization of the mind". They observe that there is an intensive global search for the "rule of law", the holy grail of good governance. This quest has led to wholesale exportation of western concepts of legality and judicial practice. But the authors enter a cautionary note about two large gaps that afflict thinking in this field. The first of these is the gap between theory and practice: between the ambitious programmes traced by the IMF, World Bank, NGOs and assorted do-gooders who think that they will lead to good governance (and its attendant economic prosperity), and the facts on the ground. The second, and more insidious because less visible, is the gap between the stated goals of individual programmes (what might be called "the practice in theory") sponsored by these organizations, and the actual activities (what might be called "the theory in practice") that are being funded. In brief, the authors conclude that we don't know what "rule of law" programmes are actually working, and we don't know why individual programmes succeed or fail. More troubling, we don't even really know what it means for a programme to succeed or fail. Most serious of all, we don't know how to design empirical studies of these issues, to frame questions and hypotheses that can be tested, and to carry out the research entailed by these hypotheses. Of course, answering all the issues raised in the preceding paragraph would require time, resources and coordination beyond the capacity of all but the most lavishly funded agencies and research teams. Hence the editors have set themselves a narrower task. They wish to focus on "rule of law" proposals that have as a target judicial reform. The collection comprises an Introduction and 11 chapters, four of which raise theoretical concerns, and six of which consider the empirical evidence from India, China, Chile and Mexico. The remaining essay considers general themes, but restricts its coverage to Latin America. At page three of the Introduction, the editors state: (…) at the very least, the chapters here encourage critical thinking about rule-of-law programs. A cautionary story that threads its way
Program for …, 2004
The Program on Energy and Sustainable Development at Stanford University is an interdisciplinary ... more The Program on Energy and Sustainable Development at Stanford University is an interdisciplinary research program focused on the economic and environmental consequences of global energy consumption. Its studies examine the development of global natural gas markets, reform ...
Beyond Kyoto: Advancing the international …, 2003
Page 1. BEYOND KYOTO: ADVANCING THE INTERNATIONAL EFFORT AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE WORKING DRAFT JUL... more Page 1. BEYOND KYOTO: ADVANCING THE INTERNATIONAL EFFORT AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE WORKING DRAFT JULY 2003 DEVELOPMENT AND CLIMATE: ENGAGING DEVELOPING COUNTRIES THOMAS C. HELLER P.R. SHUKLA ...