Software

I use a suite of natural science, economic, and integrated assessment models in my work.  These models are always open-source and were created using Mimi;  a Julia programming language package for integrated assessment models developed in connection with Resources for the Future's Social Cost of Carbon Initiative.  A number of these models that I and/or my colleagues maintain are linked below.  Please reach out with any questions and also check out the Mimi Framework user forum for additional help.


Natural Science Models

  • MimiSNEASY.jl: The Simple Non-Linear Earth System (SNEASY) model, which couples a one-dimensional diffusive energy balance model to a non-linear carbon cycle.
  • MimiFAIRv2.jl: Version 2.0 of the Finite Amplitude Impulse-Response (FAIR) simple climate-carbon-cycle model. Other model versions are also available: FAIR v1.3, FAIR v1.6.2.
  • MimiBRICK.jl: The Building blocks for Relevant Ice and Climate Knowledge (BRICK) probabilistic sea-level model, which individually models sea-level contributions from glaciers and small ice caps, land water storage, thermal expansion, and the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets.
  • Mimi_NAS_pH.jl: This package provides a simplified expression to calculate globally averaged ocean pH from the National Academies report, "Valuing Climate Damages: Updating Estimation of the Social Cost of Carbon Dioxide."
Integrated Assessment Models

  • MimiGIVE.jl: The Greenhouse Gas Impact Value Estimator (GIVE), a new integrated assessment model that implements the National Academy of Science's near-term recommendations for improving social cost of carbon estimates. This model is fully described in Rennert et al. (Nature, 2022).
  • MimiDICE2016R2.jl: Dynamic Integrated Climate-Economy (DICE) model version R2. Other available versions: DICE 2010, DICE 2013.
  • MimiRICE2010.jl: The Regional Integrated Climate-Economy (RICE) model, which is a regionalized version of the DICE model.
  • MimiFUND.jl: The Climate Framework for Uncertainty, Negotiation and Distribution (FUND) model.
  • MimiPAGE2009.jl: The Policy Analysis of the Greenhouse Effect (PAGE) model.
  • MimiNICE.jl: The Nested Inequalities Climate-Economy (NICE) model, which adds sub-regional income quintiles into the RICE model to account for the distribution of climate damages and carbon mitigation costs. (version 2.0 under development)
  • RevenueRecycling.jl: The NICE model with an empirically calibrated carbon tax revenue recycling policy component.
  • AIR.jl: The RICE model with a component that accounts for two effects of climate policies targeting co-emitting sources of carbon dioxide and air pollutants: (i) the local health co-benefits from improved air quality and (ii) the global co-harms from reduced aerosol cooling.
Other Models & Packages

  • MimiSSPs.jl: Load data from the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) for use in Mimi models.
  • RobustAdaptiveMetropolisSampler.jl: Implements the robust adaptive metropolis MCMC sampling algorithm for Bayesian model calibration in Julia.
  • MimiIWG.jl: A package that replicates the integrated assessment models used by the US government's Interagency Work Group on the Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases for its 2016 update.
  • MimiRFFSPs.jl: A package that provides probabilistic, multi-century socioeconomic (country-level) and greenhouse gas emission (global-level) scenarios for climate policy analysis.
  • MimiCIAM.jl: The Coastal Impact and Adaptation model, which estimates global coastal impacts due to sea-level rise from the perspective of economic efficiency.
  • ABC_Calibration.jl : A package to carry out likelihood-free, approximate Bayesian computation model calibrations with MCMC (under development).

Teaching

Climate Change Economics

(UC Berkeley, cross-listed in Energy & Resources, Environmental Economics & Policy, and International & Area Studies departments, graduate student instructor)


This course is a self-contained introduction to the economics of climate change. Climate change is caused by a large variety of economic activities and many of its impacts will have economic consequences. Economists have studied climate change for more than two decades and economic arguments are often powerful in policy decisions. The course will familiarize students with these arguments and equip them with the tools to participate in discussions of climate change policy through an economic lens.


Microeconomic Analysis for Business Decisions

(UC Berkeley, Haas School of Business, graduate student instructor)


Economic analysis applicable to the problems of business enterprises with emphasis on the determination of the level of prices, outputs, and inputs; effects of the state of the competitive environment on business and government policies.

About/CV

I am a AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the U.S. Department of State in the Office of the Chief Economist within the Office of the Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy and the Environment.  I was previously a postdoc at Princeton University and completed my PhD in UC Berkeley's Energy and Resources Group.

I conduct solutions-focused research on how society can pursue effective, ethically defensible greenhouse gas mitigation and adaptation policies to help those most vulnerable to a changing climate. An increasing amount of this research focuses on air pollution disparities and the potential for health co-benefits from well-designed climate and energy policies.  To carry out this work, I draw from an interdisciplinary mix of statistical methods and computational models that integrate the insights from climate science, economics, public health, and applied ethics.


Full Academic CV (pdf)
1-Pager (pdf)

Contact

Frank C. Errickson
AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow
Office of the Chief Economist
Office of the Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment
U.S. Department of State

Email: frankerrickson@gmail.com

Papers

* indicates publications where I am a co-lead author with equal contribution


Impacts of emissions uncertainty on Antarctic instability and sea-level rise.

Chloe Darnell, Frank C. Errickson*, Lisa Rennels, Tony Wong, & Vivek Srikrishnan. Under revision at Nature Climate Change.


Complexities in achieving air pollution related equity goals through a net-zero transition in the United States.

Pengfei Wang, Wei Peng, Mark Budolfson, Aniruddha Deshpande, Fabian Wagner, Frank Errickson, Xinyuan Huang, Gokul Iyer, Daniel H. Loughlin, Christopher G. Nolte, Steven J. Smith, Jinyu Shiwang, & Noah Scovronick. Under review at Nature Sustainability.


Equity weighting increases the social cost of carbon: New government guidelines could transform benefit-cost analysis of US climate policy.

Brian C. Prest, Lisa Rennels, Frank C. Errickson, & David Anthoff. Science (2024).


Comprehensive evidence implies a higher social cost of CO2.

Kevin Rennert, Frank C. Errickson*, Brian C. Prest, Lisa Rennels, Richard G. Newell, William Pizer, Cora Kingdon, Jordan Wingenroth, Roger Cooke, Bryan Parthum, David Smith, Kevin Cromar, Delavane Diaz, Frances C. Moore, Ulrich K. Müller, Richard J. Plevin, Adrian E. Raftery, Hana Ševčíková, Hannah Sheets, James H. Stock, Tammy Tan, Mark Watson, Tony Wong, & David Anthoff. Nature (2022).


Sea-level and socioeconomic uncertainty drives high-end coastal adaptation costs.

Tony E. Wong, Catherine Ledna, Hannah Sheets, Lisa Rennels, Frank C. Errickson, Delavaine Diaz, & David Anthoff. Earth's Future (2022).


MimiBRICK.jl: A Julia package for the BRICK model for sea-level change in the Mimi integrated modeling framework.

Tony E. Wong, Lisa Rennels, Frank C. Errickson, Vivek Srikrishan, Alexander Bakker, Klaus Keller, & David Anthoff. The Journal of Open Source Software (2022).


Equity is more important for the social cost of methane than climate uncertainty.

Frank C. Errickson, Klaus Keller, William D. Collins, Vivek Shrikrishnan, & David Anthoff. Nature (2021).


Protecting the poor with a carbon tax and equal per capita dividend.

Mark Budolfson, Francis Dennig, Frank C. Errickson*, Simon Feindt, Maddalena Ferranna, Marc Fleurbaey, David Klenert, Ulrike Kornek, Kevin Kuruc, Aurélie Méjean, Wei Peng, Noah Scovronick, Dean Spears, Fabian Wagner, & Stéphane Zuber. Nature Climate Change (invited Policy Brief) (2021).


Climate action with revenue recycling has benefits for poverty, inequality, and wellbeing.

Mark Budolfson, Francis Dennig, Frank C. Errickson*, Simon Feindt, Maddalena Ferranna, Marc Fleurbaey, David Klenert, Ulrike Kornek, Kevin Kuruc, Aurélie Méjean, Wei Peng, Noah Scovronick, Dean Spears, Fabian Wagner. Nature Climate Change (2021).


The social cost of carbon: advances in long-term probabilistic projections of population, gdp, emissions, and discount rates.

Kevin Rennert, Brian C. Prest, William Pizer, Richard G. Newell, David Anthoff, Cora Kingdon, Lisa Rennels, Roger Cooke, Adrian E. Raftery, Hana Ševčíková, & Frank C. Errickson. Forthcoming in Brookings Papers on Economic Activity (2021).


Utilitarian benchmarks for emissions and pledges promote equity, climate and development.

Mark Budolfson, David Anthoff, Francis Dennig, Frank C. Errickson*, Kevin Kuruc, Dean Spears, & Navroz Dubash. Nature Climate Change (2021).


Animal-based foods have high social and climate costs.

Frank C. Errickson, Kevin Kuruc, & Jonathan McFadden. Nature Food (2021).


The importance of health co-benefits under different climate policy cooperation frameworks.

Noah Scovronick, David Anthoff, Francis Dennig, Frank C. Errickson*, Maddalena Ferranna, Wei Peng, Dean Spears, Fabian Wagner, & Mark Budolfson. Environmental Research Letters (2021).


The impact of human health co-benefits on evaluations of global climate policy.

Noah Scovronick, Mark Budolfson, Francis Dennig, Frank C. Errickson*, Marc Fleurbaey, Wei Peng, Robert H. Socolow, Dean Spears, & Fabian Wagner. Nature Communications (2019).


Human health and the social cost of carbon: a primer and call to action.

Noah Scovronick, Valeri Vasquez, Frank C. Errickson, Francis Dennig, Antonio Gasparrini, Shakoor Hajat, Dean Spears, Mark Budolfson. Epidemiology (2019).