As U.S. and world energy challenges mount, the public and political debate frequently demonstrate disturbing misunderstandings of both the problems and the potential solutions. Three distinct problems – energy costs, geopolitical impacts of energy consumption, and the threat of extreme climate change – suggest different solutions that may not be well aligned with one another.  Professor Borenstein will discuss the logic and fallacies behind existing and proposed public policies responses. The energy challenges that the U.S. faces are serious, he argues, but by adhering to a few basic economic principles, the cost of meeting these challenges can be kept manageable.

Severin Borenstein is E.T. Grether Professor of Business Economics and Public Policy at the Haas School of Business, Director of the University of California Energy Institute, and a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, MA.  He is also an affiliated professor in the Agricultural and Resource Economics department and the Energy and Resources Group at UC Berkeley. He received his A.B. from U.C. Berkeley in 1978 and Ph.D. from M.I.T. in 1983.  His research focuses on business competion, strategy, and regulation.  He has published extensively on the airline, oil and gasoline,  and electricity markets, as well as on insurance, e-commerce, mining, natural gas and other industries.    Borenstein was a member of the Governing Board of the California Power Exchange from 1997 until 2003 and served on the California Attorney General's gasoline price taskforce in 1999-2000.