NEW Region


The New Economy for a Warming (NEW) Region project is studying economic opportunities for the NW-Pennsylvania area, and the southern Great Lakes region generally, arising from climate change.  Such opportunities could result from direct geophysical changes in our region – for example, it will likely be wetter on average, with more frequent extreme weather events. They could also arise from broader climate change-related shifts – for example, changing energy and transportation markets, differential impacts on regions' water supplies, or new policy frameworks.


Presque Isle: A sandy, migratory peninsula (Erie, PA)

During summer 2011 I worked with a team of student researchers to investigate possible scenarios for regional change at the industry sector level: transportation, building, energy, manufacturing, and agriculture. For each sector, what technologies and markets are likely to be important as the climate changes, what existing resources could regional firms in the industry bring to the table, and what public policy responses could facilitate the process? In the summer of 2012, research assistant Jacob Ford and I analyzed the past century's climate data and explored potential cross-linkages of new energy and transportation activity for the region. 

Some project outputs thus far:
  • Paper in the journal Technological Forecasting and Social Change: "Climate-adaptive technological change in a small region: A resource-based scenario approach" (2015).
  • Case assignment - 2010 Strategic Environmental Management course (Econ 421).
In July 2014, I testified at the EPA's Pittsburgh public comment hearing on its proposed Clean Power Plan. My remarks were based on NEW Region research results.

This project was initially inspired by related scenario creation done for  other regions. Links to some of the more interesting and relevant efforts can be found here.

Financial support from the Christian Allison and Jane France Endowment Fund, and the Andrew Wells Robertson Chair in Economics, is gratefully acknowledged.