Climate Change and Sustainable Investing

This programme gives the opportunity to obtain a better understanding of the complex relationship between climate change and the economy and finance.

You will :

• Form your opinion grounded on scientific facts on the feasibility and effectiveness of current options to fight against climate change
• Understand how climate risks affect firm fundamentals
• Understand how financial managers should incorporate climate considerations in corporate decision making
• Understand the instruments and solutions to finance clean technologies and clean energy
• Assess how climate risk factors impact security prices and investment decisions
• Understand how to implement effective low carbon investing strategies

The specialisation consists of 4 MOOCs, each requiring 4 weeks of study at an average of 3 hours per week. Therefore, the approximate time to complete the entire specialisation can be estimated at 12 weeks, with 3 hours of study per week.

SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING OF CLIMATE CHANGE

This MOOC is divided into 4 modules. With the first two, you will understand how scientists measure climate and its evolution, how climate models work and how greenhouse gases within the atmosphere play a central role in determining the climate. The last two modules introduce the main technologies that can be used to reduce carbon emissions and carbon concentration in the atmosphere, and explain how these technologies can be best combined.

Learning objectives:

• Understanding the evidence for climate change, and of its anthropogenic origin
• Understanding the basics of the carbon cycle, climate modelling, and the role of CO2 concentrations
• Critical appreciation of advantages and limitations of renewables, sequestration, and negative emission technologies

ECONOMICS AND POLICIES OF CLIMATE CHANGE

To avoid the worst climate outcomes, decisive action has to be taken. But what realistic options do we have? Is it better to act now or wait until we have more advanced and less expensive technology? How big do our abatement efforts have to be? This MOOC will help you understand how economists try to answer these questions and find the optimal course of action. It will give you the conceptual tools to draw their own conclusions.

Learning objectives:

• Understand the likely impacts on the real economy of the different courses of actions ahead of us
• Evaluate projects on a portfolio basis the economic attractiveness of various abatement projects
• Assess critically the economic desirability of different technologically feasible abatement technologies
• Assess critically the economic desirability of different technologically feasible abatement technologies

THE FINANCE OF CLIMATE CHANGE

This MOOC covers the financial risks and opportunities of climate change and how companies can finance their green transition, for example by issuing green securities. You will also learn how financial intermediaries address climate change risks and why central banks are concerned about climate change.

Learning objectives:

• Understand how climate change risk exposure affects corporate decisions and value
• Map the financial risks and opportunities of climate change
• Understand the instruments, investment funds and solutions to finance clean technologies and clean energy
• Assess how climate change impacts financial intermediaries and systemic risks

CLIMATE AWARE INVESTING

Finance may have a central role to play against climate change on the condition that risks are properly measured and managed. In this course you will be introduced to the latest academic research findings and the most commonly used methods in industry to cope with climate change financial risks. You will analyse these risks and also discuss the methodologies most widely used by asset managers to manage their portfolios’ carbon exposure.

• Understand how to measure climate risk in equity portfolio
• Learn how to manage climate risk in equity portfolio
• Implement climate aware decisions
• Understand how to design low-carbon-tracking-index portfolio