Warming the World: Economic Models of Global Warming

Humanity is risking the health of the natural environment through a myriad of interventions, including the atmospheric emission of trace gases such as carbon dioxide, the use of ozone-depleting chemicals, the engineering of massive land-use changes, and the destruction of the habitats of many species. It is imperative that we learn to protect our common geophysical and biological resources. Although scientists have studied greenhouse warming for decades, it is only recently that society has begun to consider the economic, political, and institutional aspects of environmental intervention. To do so raises formidable challenges of data modeling, uncertainty, international coordination, and institutional design.Attempts to deal with complex scientific and economic issues have increasingly involved the use of models to help analysts and decision makers understand likely future outcomes as well as the implications of alternative policies. This book presents in detail a pair of models of the economics of climate change. The models, called RICE-99 (for the Regional Dynamic Integrated model of Climate and the Economy) and DICE-99 (for the Dynamic Integrated Model of Climate and the Economy) build on the authors' earlier work, particularly their RICE and DICE models of the early 1990s. They can help policy makers design better economic and environmental policies.

" Warming the World should be required reading for policy makers, politicians, environmentalists, and the concerned public." Thomas Gale Moore Journal of Political Economy The MIT Press

This is the most important and comprehensive analysis so far of the economic consequences and policy implications of climate change. The results are always interesting sometimes surprising. A further research agenda opens up. The MIT Press

In Warming the World, Nordhaus and Boyer have brought the latest developments in the fields into dynamic models for evaluating the consequences of global warming due to human causes. In particular, they have incorporated more sophisticated analysis of the changes in greenhouse gas concentrations and the latest evidence on the damage caused by global warming. Any serious analyst or policymaker must start with the analysis of this book. Robert M. Solow, Institute Professor of Economics, Emeritus, MIT, and Nobel Laureate in Economics (1987)

This book is essential reading for anyone engaged in research on the economics of climate change. Nordhaus commands this important field. Kenneth J. Arrow, Professor of Economics Emeritus, Stanford University, and Nobel Laureate in Economics (1972)

Nordhaus, a distinguished economist, has been engaged with the greenhouse issue for more than twenty years. He is the dean of the optimization modellers. Here is his latest version, in crisp English and transparent mathematics. You cannot do better. Dale W. Jorgenson, Frederic Eaton Abbe Professor of Economics, Harvard University

Warming the World should be required reading for policy makers, politicians, environmentalists, and the concerned public. Thomas C. Schelling, School of Public Affairs, University of Maryland

This book presents in detail a pair of models of the economics of climate change. The models, called RICE-99 (for the Regional Dynamic Integrated model of Climate and the Economy) and DICE-99 (for the Dynamic Integrated Model of Climate and the Economy) build on the authors' earlier work, particularly their RICE and DICE models of the early 1990s.

William D. Nordhaus is Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale University.Joseph Boyer is an Associate in Research at Yale University.