Revisiting the social cost of carbon

W. Nordhaus

Published 2017 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

ABSTRACT

Significance The most important single economic concept in the economics of climate change is the social cost of carbon (SCC). At present, regulations with more than $1 trillion of benefits have been written for the United States that use the SCC in their economic analysis. The DICE model (Dynamic Integrated model of Climate and the Economy) is one of three integrated assessment models used to estimate the SCC in the United States. The present study presents updated estimates based on a revised DICE model (DICE-2016R). The study estimates that the SCC is $31 per ton of CO2 in 2010 US$ for the current period (2015). This study will be an important step in developing the next generation of estimates of the SCC in the United States and other countries. The social cost of carbon (SCC) is a central concept for understanding and implementing climate change policies. This term represents the economic cost caused by an additional ton of carbon dioxide emissions or its equivalent. The present study presents updated estimates based on a revised DICE model (Dynamic Integrated model of Climate and the Economy). The study estimates that the SCC is $31 per ton of CO2 in 2010 US$ for the current period (2015). For the central case, the real SCC grows at 3% per year over the period to 2050. The paper also compares the estimates with those from other sources.

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