The authors conduct a step-by-step examination of various factors that were blamed for the extended power outage on the ERCOT electricity grid in February 2021. While no single factor fully explains the calamity, the bureaucratic failure in identifying and addressing risks along fuel supply chains was a major failure. Most proposed remedies do not fundamentally address what occurred. The authors make several recommendations, some of which have already been implemented.
Peter R. Hartley, Kenneth B. Medlock III, Shih Yu (Elsie) HungFebruary 2, 2022
Texas is the source of about one-quarter of all energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the US industrial sector and about one-eighth of all CO2 emissions from the US power generation sector, with a significant proportion of emissions in both sectors located near the gulf coast. As such, Texas has the opportunity to capture significant economies of scale in carbon capture.
Kenneth B. Medlock III, Keily MillerJanuary 27, 2021
A working group led by the Baker Institute has developed an innovative measurement-based standard — “BCarbon” — for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in the soil as organic carbon. BCarbon is a scalable soil carbon storage standard designed to work for landowners and soil carbon storage buyers. The proposed standard allows landowners to monetize soil carbon storage as a property right.
Kenneth B. Medlock III, Jim BlackburnNovember 2, 2020
The authors explore the history of the resource curse and provide summarize the working paper series titled “The Role of Foreign Direct Investment in Resource-Rich Regions.”
Kenneth B. Medlock III, Keily MillerFebruary 24, 2020
The authors evaluate Argentina’s energy sector and test the hypothesis that investments in tight oil and shale gas extraction expose investors to fewer risks than extracting conventional oil and gas.
This working paper is part of a series titled “The Role of Foreign Direct Investment in Resource-Rich Regions.”
Gabriel Collins, Mark P. Jones, Jim Krane, Kenneth B. Medlock III, Francisco J. MonaldiFebruary 24, 2020
Technological progress in the exploration and production of oil and gas during the 2000s has led to a boom in upstream investment and has increased the domestic supply of fossil fuels. It is unknown, however, how many jobs this boom has created. Using time-series methods at the national level and dynamic panel methods at the state level to understand how the increase in exploration and production activity has impacted employment, this paper finds robust statistical support for the hypothesis that changes in drilling for oil and gas as captured by rig counts do, in fact, have an economically meaningful and positive impact on employment.
Mark Agerton, Peter R. Hartley, Kenneth B. Medlock III, Ted Loch-TemzelidesAugust 22, 2014
The causes and consequences of rising oil price over the past decade have been the subject of much debate. The role of speculation in financial markets has come increasingly under the microscope, with many economists arguing that in commodity markets such as oil, inventory adjustment should prevent speculative pressures from unduly influencing price. This paper investigates whether speculative pressures can exert an influence on the price of storable commodities, such as crude oil and natural gas.