As an Undergraduate Economics teacher, you can use this set of computer-based tools to help you in teaching about implementation of environmental policies by measuring the value of abatement.
This lesson plan will enable you to teach your students about assessing the benefits of abatement by analyzing a survey to measure the willingness of people to pay for climate change mitigation. Economists often face the problem of placing a value on the abatement of environmental damage, to set against the cost of implementing abatement policies. Amongst the various methods used to estimate the value of abatement are contingent valuation and hedonic pricing. In this lesson plan, students will be able to learn about the challenges of placing a value on abatement through a classroom exercise in contingent valuation of the willingness to pay (WTP) to reduce carbon emissions to mitigate climate change.
Thus, the use of this lesson plan allows you to integrate the teaching of a climate science topic with a core topic in Economics.
About Lesson Plan
Grade Level
Undergraduate
Discipline
Economics
Topic(s) in Discipline
Value of Abatement, Contingent Valuation,
Hedonic Pricing, Willingness to Pay (WTP),
Cronbach’s Alpha
Climate Topic
Climate Mitigation and Adaptation
Energy, Economics and Climate Change
Policies, Politics and Environmental Governance
Location
Global, Germany
Language(s)
English
Access
Online, Offline
Approximate Time Required
90-120 min
Contents
Teaching Module
(30-45 min)
A teaching module to explain the measurement challenges of environmental policy, specifically the value of abatement.
Use this lesson plan to help your students find answers to:
What is the value of abatement in environmental policies?
Why is it important to measure the value of abatement?
How is the value of abatement measured?
Why is estimating the value of abatement important for climate change mitigation?
Step-by-Step User Guide
Learning Outcomes
Questions/Assignments
Additional Resources
Credits
Here is a step-by-step guide to using this lesson plan in the classroom/laboratory. We have suggested these steps as a possible plan of action. You may customize the lesson plan according to your preferences and requirements.
1
Introduce the topic of value of abatement in environmental policies.
1. Use the teaching module, ‘20.6: The measurement challenges of environmental policy’ by CORE to explain the need to measure the value of abatement in the implementation of environmental policy.
3. Describe the different methods to measure the benefits of abatement- contingent valuation and hedonic pricing using the examples given in text. Explain the differences in these approaches and how these are used to measure how people value a change in their environment. Discuss how this is measured by the citizens’ willingness to pay (WTP) for the improved environment following the implementation of abatement policies. Enable student learning and evaluate understanding through the in-built exercises and questions.
4. You may choose to navigate to the following sections (20.7-20.10) to explain how future technologies and lifestyles could affect people’s preferences, discuss why addressing climate change is so difficult, and why policy choices matter in implementing environmental policies.
2
Conduct a classroom/laboratory activity to measure the willingness to pay for climate change mitigation
1. Use the project, ‘Measuring willingness to pay for climate change mitigation’ by CORE to conduct a classroom activity using data from an internet survey by the German government.
2. The online survey was conducted to measure the citizens’ willingness to pay to reduce carbon emissions as a method of mitigating climate change. The data is made available in Excel, R, and Google Sheets formats.
3. Direct your students to follow the instructions given in the text to analyze the data to answer the given set of questions.
4. The activity will enable them to ‘construct indices to measure attitudes or opinions’, ‘use Cronbach’s alpha to assess indices for internal consistency’, ‘practice recoding and creating new variables’, and ‘compare survey measures of willingness to pay’.
3
Reading assignment to enable discussion on the willingness of individuals to contribute towards the common good in the face of climate change.
1. Ask your students to read the research article, ‘Cooperation in the climate commons’ by Stefano Carattini et al., published by the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy and the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
2. Use the paper to initiate discussion on the willingness of individuals to reduce the demands on the environmental commons by adopting ‘green’ consumer behavior or by accepting expensive climate policies.
3. Finally, use the review of cases and situations given in the text to discuss whether individuals are willing to cooperate towards climate change mitigation.
The tools in this lesson plan will enable students to:
learn about the value of abatement in environmental and climate change mitigation policies
describe the methods to measure the value of abatement
discuss the willingness to pay (WTP) by individuals towards the abatement of climate change
explain the importance of measuring value of abatement for implementing climate change mitigation policies
Suggested questions/assignments for learning evaluation :
What is the value of abatement in environmental policies?
Why is it important to measure the value of abatement?
How is the value of abatement measured?
Why is estimating the value of abatement important for climate change mitigation?
If you or your students would like to explore the topic further, these additional resources will be useful.
This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
Strictly Necessary Cookies
Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.
If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.