Energy is a key input and a key business in economic development. The course first develops the current understanding of the economic development process, with a focus on the role of energy, and energy businesses and markets. Then we examine development problems and policies in resource dependent economies, middle income reforming economies, low income economies and conclude with a look at the interface between economic development and environmental protection.
This course aims to provide students with a general introduction to the basic core competencies and practical skills required of a generalist development practitioner. The course will be offered at a number of universities around the world, and each week students will have the opportunity to learn from an expert practitioner. Course topics will be grounded in a practical, multi-disciplinary approach that will focus on the inter-relationship of each of the following core fields of study: Public Health, Agriculture and Nutrition, Environment and Climate Science, Technology and Engineering, Economics, Policy, Anthropology and Social Studies, and Management. Both conceptual and practical management issues will be stressed throughout each course topic. The course will incorporate state-of-the-art web-based technologies for sharing lectures across countries, and to facilitate international discussion and collaboration among students at participating universities. Recitation is required.
The course will acquaint you modern international capital markets. You can expect to learn a substantial amount of up-to-date detail and some useful theory. Specifically, we will survey global markets for credit, equity, foreign exchange, foreign exchange derivatives, futures, interest rate swaps, credit default swaps and asset backed securities. In each case, we will learn the highlights of payments and settlement, documentation, regulation, applications for end-users, related economic theory and pricing models. The class will cover options and asset pricing theory; however, the treatment will be informal and designed to help develop intuition. One lecture each will be devoted to international banking (with an emphasis on changing capital regulation), investment banks, and hedge funds.
The world of media continues to change quickly. Legacy media outlets are struggling with their role in this new world and working to make more use of technology. Media starts ups find it hard to build audience, get sustained attention and establish credibility. Everyone worries about how they will be able to fund newsgathering and what future business models will look like. This course will explore some of the possibilities for innovation and discuss how new practices can help address some of the difficulties faced by journalists. We will consider what it takes to create new sites or tools that can actually find funding and we will meet different journalists and experts involved in some of the projects springing up around the world. By the end of this course, students will understand the basics of some media theory and scholarship and be able to speak knowledgably about the journalism climate in many different countries. Students will also be familiar with some of the changes brought about by technological innovation as well as how to analyze the successes and failures.
Prerequisites:
PHYS G6037
or the equivalent.
The elementary particles and their properties; interactions of charged particles and radiation with matter; accelerators, particle beams, detectors; conservation laws; symmetry principles; strong interactions, resonances, unitary symmetry; electromagnetic interactions; weak interactions; current topics.
Brief review of energy balance fundamentals. World energy outlook. Key uncertainties. Resource revolution. Energy efficiency, the hidden fuel. Electricity systems. Architecture of electricity markets. Thermal generation. Renewable energies. Learning curves. LCOE´s. Oil market: demand and supply, reserves, conventional and unconventional oil, energy from America, prices. Natural gas market: demand and supply, reserves, differences relative to oil markets. Resources to reserves: oil and natural gas. The renewable energies opportunity. Earth energy balance. Economics of climate change. Emissions scenarios. International climate negotiations. China´s energy challenge.
Will we run out of oil? What determines the cost of a ton of coal? Should we subsidize low-carbon or tax fossil energy? Are renewables worth the price tag? This course addresses some of the fundamental questions in energy economics. It covers markets for coal, oil, natural gas and renewables. We will gain an understanding of how the various markets work, how they do not, and what the appropriate regulatory responses are.
This is a semester-long introductory course in environmental economics. It is designed to introduce students to economic approaches to understanding and managing pollution and natural resources. There is a wide conception that the environmental and economic systems are fundamentally at odds, but hopefully, by the end of this class, you will have a more refined view. We will start the class by a quick review of the fundamental welfare theorem of economics, which states that under certain conditions, markets outcomes are efficient. This forms the basis for why economists so strongly believe in markets. We will then examine why some of those "certain conditions" might not be met for environmental problems, and whether hence government intervention is warranted or whether the market can self-regulate these problems. This forms the basis for the rest of the class where we look in more detail at cases where the government has regulated certain economic activity / pollution and whether it has done so in an efficient way. We will discuss four approaches how the government can intervene and regulate. In the last part we look at ways how the government should choose the optimal level of regulation. Finally, time permitting, we will look at several specific environmental problems in more detail, e.g., water, air, and climate change.
This course will explore economic and political models of policymaking; interest-group politics; the connections among expertise, knowledge, and policymaking; and the particular politics of policy issues that cross jurisdictions such as federalism and globalization. Many of the decisions we make and actions we take have profound environmental effects, yet we often fail to assess the systems of values underlying such actions. The class will introduce these issues in weekly case studies, where the economic and political concept will be highlighted for the case of a particular medium: fishery, forests, oil, water, etc) and also explore the limitations to such organizing principles.
The purpose of this course is to establish a core energy skill set for SIPA students and prepare them for more advanced energy courses by providing a basic language and toolset for understanding energy issues. Existing energy sources and the infrastructures that deliver them to users around the world are undergoing a period of rapid change. Limits to growth, rapidly fluctuating raw material prices, and the emergence of new technology options all contribute to heightened risk and opportunity in the energy sector.
Prerequisites: APPH E3100 or the equivalent. Knowledge of statistical physics on the level of MSAE E3111 or PHYS G4023 strongly recommended.
Crystal structure, reciprocal lattices, classification of solids, lattice dynamics, anharmonic effects in crystals, classical electron models of metals, electron band structure, and low-dimensional electron structures.
Prerequisites: APPH E3100 or equivalent.
Basics of density functional theory (DFT) and its application to complex materials. Computation of electronics and mechanical properties of materials. Group theory, numerical methods, basis sets, computing, and running open source DFT codes. Problem sets and a small project.
The class will introduce students to the current research in tax policy (broadly defined) and will give them an opportunity to develop skills in reading and evaluating contemporary economic and legal research related to tax policy. Following the discussion of the fundamental tax policy questions during the first several weeks of the term, the format will shift to a series of weekly paper presentations by leading scholars from around the country, both economists and lawyers. The second part of the course (six weeks) will meet together with the parallel class in the law school.
Prerequisites:
PHYS W3008
or its equivalent.
Fundamentals of electromagnetism from an advanced perspective with emphasis on electromagnetic fields in vaccum with no bounding surfaces present. A thorough understanding of Maxwells equations and their application to a wide variety of phenomena. Maxwells equations (in vacuum) and the Lorentz force law - noncovariant form. Scalar and vector potentials, gauge transformations. Generalized functions (delta functions and their derivatives), point changes. Fourier transforms, longitutdinal ad transverse vector fields. Solution of Maxwells equations in unbounded space for electrostatics and magnetostatics with given charge and current sources. Special relativity, Loretnz transformations, 4-momentum, relativistic reactions. Index mechanics of Cartesian tensor notation. Covariatn formulation of Maxwells equations and the Lorentz force law, Lorentz transformation properties of E and B. Lagrangian density for the electromagnetic field, Langrangian density for the Proca field. Symmetries and conservation laws, Noethers theorem. Field conservation laws (energy, linear momentum, angular momentum, stress tensor). Monochromatic plane wave solutions of the time-dependent source-free Maxwell equations, elliptical polarization, partially-polarized electromagnetgic waves, Stokes parameters. Solution of the time-dependent Maxwell equations in unbounded space with given chare and current sources (retarded and advanced solutions). Properties of electromagnetic fields in the radiaion zone, angular distribution of radiated power, frequency distribution of radiated energy, radiation form periodic and non-periodic motions. Radiation from antennas and antenna arrays. Lienard-Wiechert fields, the relativistic form of the Larmor radiation forumla, synchrotron radiation, bremsstrahlung, undulator and wiggler radiation. Electric dipole and magnetic dipole radiation. Scattering of electromagnetic radiation, the differential scattering cross-section, low-energy and high-energy approximations, scattering from a random or periodic array of scatterers. Radiation reaction force, Feynman-Wheeler theoryy. The macroscopic Maxwell equations (spatial averaging to get P, M, D, H). Convolutions, linear materials (permittivity, permeability, and conductivity), causality, analytics continuation, Kramers-Kronig relations. Propagation of monochromatic plane waves in isotropic and non-isotropic linear materials, ordinary ad extraordinary waves. Cherenkov radiation, transition rad