University of Cambridge

Position Title/Short Description

Full Text of JOE Listing:

The Energy Policy Research Group at Cambridge Judge Business School is the leading energy economics research group in Europe.

We are looking to appoint a Research Assistant/Associate at Cambridge Judge Business School within the economics and policy subject group. The post holder will support a new multi-institution consortium focused on assessing greenhouse gas removal (GGR) technologies such as bioenergy with CCS (BECCS) and direct air capture of CO2 (DAC) in addition to other measures such as afforestation. The targets laid out in the Paris Accord agreed in December 2015 will likely rely heavily on the extensive deployment of these GGR) technologies. The focus of the consortium is on answering five key questions: (i) Under what conditions is meeting the Paris commitments possible? (ii) How does the feasible portfolio of GGR technologies vary between regions? (iii) What are the region-specific rate-limiting steps in GGR deployment? (iv) Can inter-regional cooperation reduce the cost associated with meeting the 2°C target? and (v) How will GGR technologies interact with and provide value to the low carbon energy system?

In particular, the post holder will be expected: (i) to conduct original analysis of the political economy of GGR technologies in comparative context, (ii) to examine social license to operate of different GGR technologies, (iii) to explore the framing of different GGR technologies, (iv) to explore the political limitations on scaling up different options, and (v) to help design realistic GGR deployment scenarios to be implemented in the modeling frameworks being employed by our project partners.

You should be educated to PhD level in public policy, energy economics, applied economics, political science, or other relevant discipline (e.g., geography, etc). You will ideally have both strong qualitative skills such as in conducting interviews, focus groups and archival analysis and strong quantitative skills, particularly in applied econometrics. You will have knowledge of climate and energy policy, plus a demonstrated ability to design, conduct, analyse and write up survey research. Good time management and planning skills are essential, with an aim to produce relevant academic papers in leading international academic journals.

This is a fixed term appointment for 2 years.

Successful candidates at Research Associate level who have not been awarded their PhD by the appointment date will be under-appointed as a Research Assistant (Grade 5) employed on a salary of £28,936 per annum. Upon award of the PhD the individual will be promoted to Research Associate (Grade 7).