The Economy-Wide Implications of Low-Carbon Electricity and Transportation

Like many emerging economies, India faces two simultaneous fundamental economic challenges– increasing prosperity, and reducing emissions. At present, however, there is little understanding of how to combine a low-carbon energy transition in sectors like electricity or transportation with an ambitious, energy-driven development agenda.

In this project, NCAER will modify its established computable general equilibrium (CGE) model to assess how specific decarbonization strategies in transportation and electricity could best support development goals, and, conversely, how development strategies might drive decarbonization in electricity and transportation.

Specifically, NCAER will modify their established, national CGE model to represent detailed regional energy systems and then run this modified version of the model to explore the implications of multiple electricity and transportation transition strategies. NCAER will compare their results with those of detailed energy system models and, as necessary, make improvements to capture, for example, the rapid evolution of energy technologies that might be spurred by these detailed sectoral policies.

This project will be conducted as part of the Green Macroeconomic Modeling Initiative (GMMI) facilitated by the Bezos Earth Fund – the project team will participate in GMMI diagnostic activities and project meetings and will publish their research results as part of a GMMI special journal issue.