Marilyn Brown
PUBP 4803
PUBP 8803
Spring 2017

Environmental finance is concerned with finance and investment in the ecological environment and sustainable systems. It involves converting ecosystem services and products into financial instruments, which can be traded and sold, so as to establish a market price. This course will explore social, cultural and environmental dimensions of the financialization of environmental goods and services. The course will begin with an introduction to finance, introducing students to key terms, practices, and institutions. We will then examine the logic and origins of environmental finance in both the public and private sector, and at the community, state, and national scales. At these scales we will explore systems of environmental finance including carbon-trading, renewable energy credits, white tags, local currencies and ecosystem service pricing and swapping, to understand the developing norms of environmental finance. At the community scale, we will examine the climate action plans of cities and the investment mechanisms being used to fund their implementation. We will also consider the plausible reconfigurations of urban infrastructure services and financing that are emerging as the result of advances in information and communication technologies (ICT). This transformation is enabling a shift toward open markets and shared ownership of distributed assets. This transformation offers opportunities for a wide array of residents to benefit more broadly in the urban economy. It is exemplified by the distributed provision of electricity via leased rooftops with solar panels, transportation services through Uber/Lyft-like ridesharing, on-demand rental units in homes through Airbnb type arrangements, and with water management and storage increasingly being integrated into buildings. The question is, what do these changes mean for community sustainability? 

Course Type
Partner Engagement