Weston Roundtable Lecture Series

One criticism of U.S. energy policy is its volatility. Changing policy is a problem because systemic inertia—for example, long lifetimes of capital stock in the energy industry and atmospheric residence times of greenhouse gases—implies a need for persistence and sustained effort in order to achieve social goals. But changing policy has benefits as well: it allows for the assimilation of new information into the policy making process, as well as for experimentation and policy learning.