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Simon Sharpe is a Policy Associate at the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP).
Simon Sharpe is Director of Economics for the UN Climate Champions, and a Senior Fellow at the World Resources Institute. He was previously Deputy Director of the UK government’s COP26 Unit, where he led international campaigns on energy, transport, land use, science and innovation. His other roles in government included leading international climate change strategy, developing the approach to clean growth in the UK’s industrial strategy, and serving as head of private office to Ministers of State for Energy and Climate Change.
He also served on diplomatic postings to China and India. Simon has published academic papers on climate change science and economics, and policy reports on climate change risk assessment, economics, and diplomacy.
His current focus is on the Breakthrough Agenda – a process to strengthen international collaboration to accelerate transitions in each emitting sector of the global economy; and on projects to apply new economic thinking to climate change policy, including the Economics of Energy Innovation and System Transition project, working with China, India and Brazil.
Selected publications
- Academic working papers
- Sharpe, S., Mercure, J-F., Vinuales, J., Ives, M., Grubb, M., Pollitt, H., Knobloch, F. and Nijsse, F.J.M.M. (2021). Deciding how to decide: Risk-opportunity analysis as a generalisation of cost-benefit analysis. UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose, Working Paper Series (IIPP WP 2021/03). Available at: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/public-purpose/wp2021-03
- Sharpe, S. and Lenton, T. (2020). Upward-scaling tipping cascades to meet climate goals: Plausible grounds for hope. UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose, Working Paper Series (IIPP WP 2020-07). Available at: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/public-purpose/wp2020-07
- The economics of change: policy and appraisal for missions, market shaping and public purpose Kattel, Mazzucato, Ryan-Collins & Sharpe (2018)
- Reports
- Grubb, M. et al., (2021): The New Economics of Innovation and Transition: Evaluating Opportunities and Risks
- Victor, D.G., Geels, F.W. and Sharpe, S. (2019). Accelerating the Low Carbon Transition: The Case for Stronger, More Targeted and Coordinated International Action
- Climate Change: A Risk Assessment, Centre for Science and Policy, University of Cambridge (2015)
- Journals
- Lenton, T. et al., (2022): Operationalising positive tipping points towards global sustainability
- Mercure, J-F. et al., (2021): Risk-opportunity analysis for transformative policy design and appraisal
- Sharpe, S. and Lenton, T. (2021): Upward-scaling tipping cascades to meet climate goals: plausible grounds for hope, Climate Policy, DOI: 10.1080/14693062.2020.1870097
- Sharpe, S.: Telling the boiling frog what he needs to know: why climate change risks should be plotted as probability over time, Geosci. Commun., 2, 95–100, https://doi.org/10.5194/gc-2-95-2019, 2019.