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Energy Finance and Climate Transition Risk

Energy Finance and Climate Transition Risk Conference
April 9 and 10, 2026
University of North Carolina and The Review of Financial Studies

Conference Organizers:
Aymeric Bellon (UNC), Paolo Fulghieri (UNC), Stefano Giglio (Yale),
Stephen Arbogast (Director, Energy Center, UNC)

RFS Editorial Sponsors:
Xavier Giroud (Columbia Business School) and Anna Pavlova (London Business School)

Keynote Speakers:
Robert Engle (NYU), 2003 Nobel Laureate in Economics
Bobby Tudor (Tudor Pickering), Marcin Kacperczyk (Imperial College)

This conference is by invitation only.

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AGENDA

April 8, 2026

TIME  EVENT
6:00 – 8:00 PM Welcome reception

April 9, 2026

TIME  EVENT
9:00 AM Welcome to the Energy Center Colloquium by Stephen Arbogast (University of North Carolina)
9:10 AM Keynote address: Bobby Tudor (Tudor Pickering): Emerging Issues in Energy Finance
9:50 AM Panel Session: Oil & Gas Valuation in an Era of Transition
Panel Chair: Stephen Arbogast (University of North Carolina)
Panelists: Bobby Tudor (Tudor Pickering), Al Harper (ExxonMobil), James Casey (Morgan Stanley), Jacob Sagi (University of North Carolina).
10:50 AM Break
11:10 AM Panel Session: Valuation of Low Carbon Businesses Dependent on Public Support
Panel Chair: Jane Stricker (HETI, BP, ret)
Panelists: David Levy (ExxonMobil), John Clapp (Deriva Renewables), Marco Ceccarelli (Free University Amsterdam), Sanjiv Shah (Piper Sandler).
12:10 PM Lunch. Presentation by Stephen Arbogast (University of North Carolina): Energy Center and research challenges
1:25 PM Welcome to Energy Finance and Climate Transition Risk by Paolo Fulghieri (University of North Carolina)
1:30 PM Session 1: The Cost of Carbon
Chair: Anna Pavlova (London Business School)
Carbon Burden
Lubos Pastor (University of Chicago), Robert Stambaugh (University of Pennsylvania), Lucian Taylor (University of Pennsylvania)
Discussants: Pedro Matos (University of Virginia), James Casey (Morgan Stanley)
2:20 PM Break
2:25 PM Panel Session: Carbon and Equity Valuations
Panel Chair: Stefano Giglio (Yale University)
Panelists: Lucian Taylor (University of Pennsylvania), Marcin Kacperczyk (Imperial College), Sanjiv Shah (Piper Sandler)
3:25 PM Break
3:35 PM Session 2: Financing High Growth Electricity Demand
Chair: Anil Shivdasani (University of North Carolina)
Is AI trained on Public Money? Evidence from U.S. Data Centers
Adam Feher (Université de Lausanne), Emilia Garcia-Appendini (University of St. Gallen), Roxana Mihet (Université de Lausanne)
Discussants: Sumundu Watugala (Indiana University), Bill Currens (Duke Energy)
4:25 PM Break
4:30 PM Panel Session: Financing High Growth Electricity Demand via Project Debt, Bond Markets & Private Capital
Panel Chair: Stephen Arbogast (University of North Carolina)
Panelists: Jonathan Kim (Mizuho Bank), Bill Currens (Duke Energy), Andrew McCabe (US Dept. of Energy Loan Programs), Matthew Gustafson (Pennsylvania State University)
5:30 PM Adjourn and Cocktails
6:30 PM Conference Dinner (co-sponsored by Moody’s Analytics)
Dinner Keynote: Marcin Kacperczyk (Imperial College): What is the carbon premium a premium on?

Host: Aymeric Bellon (University of North Carolina)

April 10, 2026

TIME  EVENT
9:00 AM Session 3: Physical climate risk and local adjustment
Chair: Greg Brown (University of North Carolina)
Temperature, Adaptation, and Local Industry Concentration
Jacopo Ponticelli (Northwestern University), Qiping Xu (University of Illinois Urbana Champaign), Stefan Zeume (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign)
Discussant: Christoph Schiller (Ohio State University)
House Prices Under Rising Seas: Measuring Deep Uncertainty in Theory and Evidence
Michael Barnett (Arizona State University), Jacob Dice (Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas), Toan Phan (Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond), David Rodziewicz (Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas), Constantine Yannelis (University of Cambridge)
Discussant: Jacob Sagi (University of North Carolina)
10:30 AM Break
10:45 AM Session 4: Pricing climate and transition risk
Chair: Riccardo Colacito (University of North Carolina)
Climate Risk Pricing
Nicolae Garleanu (Washington University in St. Luis), Lasse Pedersen (Copenhagen Business School)
Discussant: Marcin Kacperczyk (Imperial College)
Cap and Trade with Imperfect Hedging
Bruno Biais (HEC-Paris), Johan Hombert (HEC-Paris), Daniel Schmidt (HEC-Paris), Pierre-Olivier Weill (University of California, Los Angeles)
Discussant: Jan Starmans (Stockholm School of Economics)
12:15 PM Lunch
1:00 PM Keynote Address: Robert Engle, Nobel Laureate (New York University): The Impact of Climate Risk on Financial Markets.

Host: Stefano Giglio (Yale University)

2:00 PM Break
2:15 PM Session 5: Carbon markets and private climate action
Chair: Xavier Giroud (Columbia Business School)
The market for voluntary carbon offsets
Florian Berg (MIT), Marco Ceccarelli (Free University Amsterdam), Florian Heeb (Leibniz Institute for Financial Research), Alexey Ivashchenko (Free University Amsterdam), Roberto Rigobon (MIT), Remco Zwinkels (Free University Amsterdam) 
Discussant: Deeksha Gupta (Johns Hopkins University)
Green Waste: (Mis)allocation of Green Investment Subsidies
Ingvil Gaarder (University of Chicago), Morten Grindaker (University of Chicago), Tom Meling (Ohio State University), Magne Mogstad (University of Chicago) 
Discussant: Olivier Darmouni (HEC-Paris)
3:45 PM Break
4:00 PM Session 6: Energy transition, electricity markets, and financing
Chair: Jérôme Taillard (Babson College)
Financing Investment in Electricity
Olivier Darmouni (HEC-Paris), Clemens Lehner (Columbia Business School), Pari Sastry (University of Pennsylvania)
Discussant: Matthew Gustafson (Pennsylvania State University)
Biodiversity Impacts of Renewable Energy
Haozhou Gong (University of Hong Kong), Chen Lin (University of Hong Kong), Zacharias Sautner (University of Zurich), Thomas Schmid (University of Hong Kong)
Discussant: Arthur van Benthem (University of Pennsylvania)
5:30 PM Adjourn

PROGRAM COMMITTEE
Pat Akey (ESSEC), Ian Appel (UVA), Jan Bena (UBC), Florian Berg (MIT), Tobias Berg (Frankfurt), Ran Duchin (Boston College), Daniel Garrett (Wharton), Mariassunta Giannetti (HHS), Deeksha Gupta (Johns Hopkins), Matthew Gustafson (Penn State), Joel Houston (U of Florida), Po-Hsuan Hsu (NTHU), Kris Jacobs (U of Houston), Ravi Jagannathan (Northwestern), Sehoon Kim (U of Florida), Philipp Krueger (U of Geneve), Mathias S. Kruttli (Indiana), Augustin Landier (HEC Paris), Doron Levit (U of Washington), Pedro Matos (UVA), Adair Morse (UC Berkeley), Marcus Opp (HHS), Michael G. Pollitt (Cambridge), Robert Ready (Lundquist), Geert Rouwenhorst (Yale), Pari Sastry (Wharton), Zacharias Sautner (Zurich), Julien Sauvagnat (Bocconi), Sophie Shive (Notre Dame), Christoph Schiller (OSU), Kelly Shue (Yale), Laura Starks (UT Austin), Jan Starmans (HHS), Johannes Stroebel (NYU), Jerome Taillard (Babson), Sumudu Watugala (Indiana), Michael Wittry (OSU), Jeffrey Wurgler (NYU), Qiping Xu (UIUC), Ayako Yasuda (UC Davis), Federica Zeni (EPFL).

CONTACT FOR ADMINISTRATIVE QUESTIONS
Katherine Gusler (she/her)
Finance Area – Faculty Executive Coordinator
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Kenan-Flagler Business School
300 Kenan Center Drive, 4100 McColl Bldg. | CB 3490
Chapel Hill, NC 27599
Phone: 919-962-0487
katherine_gusler@kenan-flagler.unc.edu