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Michael Panfil

Course Syllabi

Risk Analysis and Environmental Management

This course will introduce students to core concepts, learnings, and frameworks in risk and environmental management, with a focus on climate change-related risks. The class will explore a variety of approaches to risk analysis, drawing from practices across financial actors and economics sectors.

The course is broadly broken into three parts, organized into: (1) risk identification; (2) communicating and framing of risk; and (3) risk management. Classes involve a combination of lecture, student participation, guest lecture, and simulation.

Topics on: Corporate Sustainability Strategy, Operations

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Bruce Usher

Course Syllabi

Climate Finance – Fall 2024

Climate change may be today’s most serious challenge to the future of humanity. Scientists have concluded that avoiding catastrophic climate change will require a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050 or shortly thereafter, a dramatic reversal after several hundred years of industrial growth. This will require a rapid transformation of the global economy, requiring trillions of dollars in capital and creating new and risks and opportunities for investors to finance the transition. This course builds on the lessons learned in B8705 Business and Climate Change. The course begins with an introduction to climate finance and the topic of carbon markets, followed by classes on project finance to finance renewable energy, venture and growth capital to finance emerging climate technologies, and public equity strategies including divestment and ESG investing. Financial products in the fixed income and insurance markets are examined for climate impact, followed by a class session on development finance to understand the unique challenges and solutions to investing in climate solutions in emerging markets. The course wraps-up with a class session on the strategies used by banks and investment firms for the transition to net zero, concluding with a discussion of the impact of the climate crisis on opportunities and careers in finance.

Topics on: Climate Finance

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Sarah Light

Course Syllabi

Climate and Environmental Leadership in Action

Climate change and environmental degradation pose some of the most complex challenges of our time. Building a sustainable future requires active and creative leadership by individuals, organizations, governments, and business firms. This half-credit (.5 cu) course integrates scholarship in leadership theory, environmental and climate management, public policy, and ethics to explore questions such as: What are the greatest challenges in environmental and climate leadership today?

How can a firm, nonprofit organization, or individual lead in this space? How can we integrate environmental and climate considerations into our vision of what makes an individual or an organization a leader? What can we learn about leadership from being in “the environment”? Through the partnership of the McNulty Leadership Program, students will engage in a highly experiential way both in the classroom and in the field on a uniquely customized Leadership Venture over Spring Break. This expedition-style experience with students and course instructors combines both “being in the environment” and engaging in discussions with organizations that are climate and LEGAL STUDIES AND BUSINESS ETHICS 2600, Sarah E. Light, Spring 2023 – Syllabus Page 2 environmental leaders. The transferable nature of the expedition is at the heart of the student’s learning, bringing hands-on lessons to real life.

Topics on: Corporate Sustainability Strategy

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Gernot Wagner

Course Syllabi

Climate Policy – Spring 2025

Climate change is the world’s most perfect public policy problem: it’s more global, more long-term, more uncertain, and more irreversible than most others. It stands alone in the combination of all four. That also turns it into the world’s most perfect global externality problem: the benefits of fossil-fuel use are internalized, the costs largely externalized. And while misguided market forces are the root cause of climate change, guiding them in the right direction is fundamental to the solution. In this course we explore the fast-changing global climate policy landscape shaping business. We explore the economic principles at work, analyze individual corporate and finance efforts to lead, dive into the regulatory environments around the world, and look to how the clean-energy race creates unique challenges and opportunities.

Topics on: Climate Policy

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Greg Niehaus

Course Syllabi

Climate Change Risk Management, Insurance, and Finance

After providing background on climate change risk and how it is modeled, the course covers important risk management and financial topics, such as the appropriate discount rate for valuing expected climate damages, potential impediments to private market incentives for adaption, mitigation, insurance, and financing of innovation to reduce GHG emissions. Public policy responses are then discussed. The last third of the course will focus on the impact of climate change risk on insurance and securities markets. The course is designed for Risk Management and Insurance Majors and Finance Majors who are interested in applying risk management and financial concepts and tools to issues raised by climate change.

Topics on: Climate Finance, Climate Investing, Climate Policy, Decision, Risk, and Operations

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Cynthia Thompson

Course Syllabi

Leading Organizational Change for Environmental Sustainability

Many organizations are now (finally!) attempting to incorporate environmental sustainability initiatives into their strategic planning and day-to-day operations. The success or failure of these initiatives often rests on the ability of leaders to implement and manage the change process. This course will focus on the organizational change process, with particular focus on creating and managing transformational change around sustainability initiatives.
Note: Course taught at Baruch College, City University of New York

Topics on: Environmental Leadership

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Johannes Stroebel

Course Syllabi

Climate Finance: An Economic and Financial Approach to Climate Change

Climate change presents one of the central challenges of our generation, with a wide range of effects on financial markets and the broader economy. At the same time, financial markets play an important role in financing the transition to a net-zero economy. In this class, we study the interaction between climate change and firms, financial markets, energy markets, regulators, and policy makers.

Given that climate change and sustainability issues more generally are affecting nearly every aspect of the corporate, regulatory, and non-profit worlds, the class will be valuable for students with a wide range of backgrounds and career goals, whether they are directly interested in climate and sustainability issues or primarily want to gain a better understanding of how these issues influence more traditional roles in the corporate and financial sector.

The class is very applied in its outlook—for example, a range of guest speakers from industry, regulators, and nonprofits will visit the classroom—but we will frame the analysis through the lens of economic frameworks that help students think through the interactions between climate change and the broader economy in a systematic way. The objective is that the broad selection of topics and guest speakers will provide a variety of complementary perspectives on how climate change will shape economics and finance over the coming decades.

Topics on: Climate Finance, Climate Sustainability

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Robert Rigobon

Course Syllabi

Applied Macro and International Economics II

The first one addresses questions of sustainability from a macroeconomic point of view. The underlying problem is how can standards of living be improved in a sustainable manner. In this context, sustainability has more than one dimension: (i) obviously sustainability from the environmental and resource use; but also from the (ii) social and political; (iii) institutions; (iv) economy and markets; (v) organizations; (vi) relations; (vii) and personal. Growth in standards of living and social wellbeing needs all dimensions to be internally consistent. The second part of the course deals with two topics. ESG measurement and Crypto Assets.

Topics on: Climate Finance, Climate Policy, Climate Sustainability

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Daniel Vermeer

Course Syllabi

Climate Change, Sustainability & Corporate Governance

Global challenges such as urbanization, food security, water crises, inequality, natural resource degradation, and climate change increasingly present material risks to corporations. Yet these same trends can create profitable opportunities for companies if innovation is harnessed to create products and business models that provide solutions for growing global markets.

In the course, we will examine how businesses assess their risks and opportunities, and how they develop strategies to promote more sustainable practices. (Formerly called “Sustainable Business Strategy”)

Topics on: Climate Justice, Climate Sustainability, Corporate Sustainability Strategy

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Daniel Esty

Course Syllabi

Climate Change Policy and Perspectives

This course will examine the scientific, economic, legal, political, institutional, regulatory, and historical underpinnings of climate change as an issue and the related policy challenges of creating and sustaining a prosperous decarbonized modern society. Particular attention will be given to analyzing the existing U.S. and international framework of treaties, laws, regulations, and policies and the incentives they have created to address the build-up of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere.

The course will center on a set of critical questions including: What would a 21st century policy framework that is designed to deliver a successful response to climate change look like? Does the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement provide the right foundation for action? How should issues of (in)equity be addressed? How might incentives be structured to engage the business community in climate change problem-solving?

While designed as a lecture course, class sessions will be highly interactive. Required readings cover broad thematic territory, commensurate with the sweeping coverage of the course. Readings include several books and a number of articles, studies, and reports that will be available on the Canvas. Students are expected to come to each class prepared to engage in back and forth dialogue around critical topics and questions, which are provided for each class session in the syllabus below.

There are no prerequisites for this course, although some familiarity with environmental law and policy will be helpful, as would a basic understanding of climate change science. As the course will reference a wide range of current events, we recommend that you read a major daily newspaper to stay abreast of developments in the energy and environmental domains. The Yale University Library provides online access to The New York Times, the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Foreign Affairs. The library also offers access to “survey” publications such as Energy & Environment Publishing, a well-regarded news service that specializes in energy and environmental topics.

Students are encouraged to enroll simultaneously in Professor Sue Biniaz’s four-week “Climate Change Negotiations” mini-course, which will cover complementary material – or her full semester course within the Jackson Institute. Students interested in attending the 2019 Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP25) in Santiago, Chile may also want to enroll in Professor Gordon Geballe’s half-semester “International Organizations and Conferences” course, which will cover practical details about the COP process. The Geballe course will prepare students to contribute as informed delegates at COP25. Students enrolled in the Geballe course will participate in a special weekly discussion section of FES 840a, led by Sophie Boehm (FES ’20).

Topics on: Climate Policy, Climate Sustainability

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Witold Henisz

Course Syllabi

Political and Social Environment of the Multinational Firm

The financial significance of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) factors and stakeholder opinions of the acceptability of a firm’s operations (i.e., the social license to operate) is mounting yet the data, frameworks and tools informing investors, consultants and corporates is unreliable. The course provides students novel data, frameworks and tools than can guide the alignment of stakeholder opinions on ESG factors, valuation and strategy.

Estimates of the capital expenditures necessary to achieve a net-zero emissions and the 1.5 degrees Celsius global warming target exceed $50 Trillion over the next 30 years. Estimates of the economic damage caused by racial injustice in the United States alone surpass $16 Trillion. While such costs may seem overwhelming, $35.3 Trillion (36% of total global assets under management) actively weigh ESG issues in 2020, up from $13.3 Trillion (21% of global AUM) in 2012. During this same period, the share of executives, board members, and investment managers who consider climate risk, racial justice and other ESG issues to be material to their business decisions has doubled. If a business case for ESG issues can be demonstrated, pools of capital are poised to make an impact.

Topics on: Climate Policy, Corporate Sustainability Strategy

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Bruce Usher

Course Syllabi

Climate Tech

Climate Tech refers to a broad range of technologies designed to mitigate the drivers and impacts of climate change. Development and commercialization of these technologies is essential if humanity is to maintain global prosperity while also avoiding catastrophic climate change. This immersion course provides students with the opportunity to work on a real-world technology to address climate change.

Students will be placed in teams of four, composed of two CBS students and two SEAS students. Student teams will be matched with venture capital funds actively financing climate tech that have identified an innovative technology for mitigating or adapting to climate change. Students will meet virtually with their assigned venture fund at the beginning of the course, during a mid-point check-in, and at the end of the course for the final presentation. The funds will provide guidance on technologies, sectors, and approaches most likely to receive early-stage investments.

Each team will be tasked with assessing their assigned technology on (i) technical viability, (ii) commercial opportunity, and (iii) impact on mitigating or adapting to climate change. The final course deliverables are a presentation to classmates, a presentation to each team’s assigned investment fund, and a written report to the investment fund. Students are also required to complete a reflections assignment at the conclusion of the course. During weeks 4 – 11, when you’re working with the venture capital fund, you will spend up to nine hours every week doing independent research, collaborating with the fund, and completing assignments.

Topics on: Climate Tech

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Jillian Grennan

Course Syllabi

Sustainable Investment Fund

The key responsibilities of those managing the Haas Sustainable Investment Fund, include: b. establishing priority sustainability issue areas, investment vehicles, and selection criteria, these could be related to specific sustainability issue areas such as Climate or Human Rights or to particular investment vehicles such as public or private equity

Topics on: Climate Investing, Climate Sustainability, Corporate Sustainability Strategy

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Open CC

Course Syllabi

Systems Thinking for Sustainability

This course is designed to provide an introduction to the relevance of systems thinking as a way for businesses to promote sustainability:

Understand the systemic nature of sustainability and the challenges it poses for “business as usual”.
Appreciate and empathize with the perspectives and demands of different stakeholders brought together around sustainable development issues.
Comprehend and apply a suite of systems thinking tools that provide insight into the causes and consequences of systemic problems, among them:
1. Causal loop diagrams
2. Theories of change
3. Simulations and experiments
Identify leverage points for individual and organizational impact in the context of sustainability’s grand challenges.
Recognize and hone skills that will allow you to become an effective agent for change towards sustainability in organizational settings.

Topics on: Climate Investing, Climate Sustainability, Climate Tech

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Gary Survis

Course Syllabi

Environmental Sustainability and Value Creation

It was not long ago when business looked at environmental issues and their impact as a compliance exercise. Slowly, at first, leading businesses began to change their concept of environmental management to look beyond simply meeting governmental dictates. These organizations began to evolve and utilize “sustainability strategies” to create new ways to drive value creation by bringing sustainability to the core of their business strategy. This seismic shift was accompanied by a bottomline emphasis that, in some cases, turned sustainability efforts into profit centers. Today, there has been a shift, yet again, to confront what the reality that business must lead our world’s response to climate change and to help avoid disaster.

Businesses must be prepared for climate change’s impacts on their operations and must be fully positioned to drive value creation and innovation in these challenging times. Business cannot simply react to environmental mandates; they must lead and drive change! 2 Sustainable initiatives are increasingly not hidden within the silos of sustainability, EHS (environmental, health, and safety), or CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) departments, but have become much more seamlessly integrated into the operations of enterprise functional disciplines. Today, to effectively work in senior management, an executive needs to be knowledgeable not only about their specific business function, but also on how their business will be impacted by environmental supply chain disruptions, requirements around sustainability reporting, ESG (environmental, social, and governance) demands on a business, ability to market sustainable product attributes, managing energy, water, and food needs globally, and sustainable technology to drive new initiatives

Topics on: Climate Sustainability

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Daniel Esty

Course Syllabi

Pathways to a Net-Zero Greenhouse Gas Emissions Future

This advanced climate change seminar will explore pathways to a low-greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions future with an emphasis on the policy frameworks required to establish a just transition to a clean energy economy — as well as the business, industry, and societal transformations that will be needed to respond successfully to climate change. Each session will introduce students to critical topics including: theories of change, climate change policy frameworks (at the global, national, state/provincial, and local levels), technology challenges and opportunities, incentives to spur innovation, finance strategies for nations in both the Global North and Global South, the role of private capital and sustainability-minded investors, climate justice and equity considerations, and potential points of policy leverage to drive transformative change. Students will be asked to think critically about the obstacles to deep decarbonization and the trade-offs across social objectives that might complicate the mobilization of society in response to the climate change challenge.

Topics on: Climate Sustainability, Decarbonization, Energy

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