Nordhaus, Kortum Win Major Prizes

Two Cowles Foundation faculty members have been awarded prestigious awards. William Nordhaus, Sterling Professor of Economics & Professor, School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, was named a 2016 Andrew Carnegie Fellow, and Sam Kortum, James Burrows Moffatt Professor of Economics, was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Nordhaus is one of 33 winners of the 2016 Andrew Carnegie Fellows Program who was selected for his project proposal, “Economic modeling of irreversible and path-dependent processes in climate change.” His project will use the example of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) to analyze optimal climate policy in the face of irreversible or partially reversible responses to accumulating greenhouse gases. According to Nordhaus, the end result of the project will produce a major research publication, open-source software that will be available to other scholars and analysts, and an article for a general audience explaining the significance and interest of these approaches and their importance for understanding how policy should address irreversible and path-dependent processes. He will receive up to $200,000 toward the funding of one to two years of his research and writing for his project. Sam Kortum will join 212 other members elected into the 2016 class of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences for his leadership and research contribution in the field of economics. In announcing this year’s fellows, American Academy of Arts and Sciences President Jonathan F. Fanton said, “As individuals, in their respective fields and professions, these newly elected members have extended the limits of what we can do as a people, a nation, and a world.” The new class will be inducted at a ceremony on October 8, 2016, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. According to its site, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences was founded in 1780 and is, “one of the country’s oldest learned societies and independent policy research centers, convening leaders from the academic, business, and government sectors to respond to the challenges facing—and opportunities available to—the nation and the world. Members contribute to Academy publications and studies of science, engineering, and technology policy; global security and international affairs; the humanities, arts, and education; and American institutions and the public good.”