Faculty
John Reilly is the co-director of the Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, and a Senior Lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management.
An energy, environmental, and agricultural economist, Reilly focuses on understanding the role of human activities as a contributor to global environmental change and the effects of environmental change on society and the economy. A key element of his work is the integration of economic models of the global economy as it represents human activity with models of biophysical systems, including the ocean, atmosphere, and terrestrial vegetation. By understanding the complex interactions of human society with our planet, the goal is to aid in the design of policies that can effectively limit the contribution of human activity to environmental change, to facilitate adaptation to unavoidable change, and to understand the consequences of the deployment of large-scale energy systems that will be needed to meet growing energy needs.
Reilly holds a BS in economics and political science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison as well as an MS and a PhD in economics from the University of Pennsylvania.
Featured Publication
"The Impact of Water Scarcity on Food, Bioenergy and Deforestation."Winchester, Niven, Kirby Ledvina, Kenneth Strzepek, and John M. Reilly. The Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics Vol. 62, No. 3 (2018): 327-351.
Featured Publication
"Exploring the Impacts of a National U.S. CO2 Tax and Revenue Recycling Options with a Coupled Electricity-Economy Model."Caron, Justin, Stuart M. Cohen, Maxwell Brown, and John M. Reilly. Climate Change Economics Vol. 9, No. 1 (2018): 1-40.
Yuan, Mei, Alexander R. Barron, Noelle E. Selin, Paul D. Picciano, Lucy E. Metz, John M Reilly, and Henry D. Jacoby. Environmental Research Letters Vol. 17, No. 5 (2022): 054019.
Reilly, John M., Y. -H. Chen, and Henry D. Jacoby. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications Vol. 8, No. 16 (2021).
DeLisi, C. et al. BioDesign Research Vol. 2020, (2020): 1016207.
Paltsev, Sergey, Valerie Karplus, Henry Chen, Ioanna Karkatsouli, John M. Reilly, and Henry D. Jacoby. Climate Policy Vol. 15, No. 4 (2015): 438-457.
If one roof covered with solar panels is good, then two are twice as good, right? And 100 are 100 times as good? That isn’t true with a lot of good things...
"Russia has huge amounts of natural gas and coal, so there's no real economic incentive for them to develop wind."
"If these companies had very concrete, detailed plans to get to even a 20 percent reduction by 2030, I'd feel a lot more comfortable."
As climate change unfolds before our eyes, what can the U.S. do to rapidly reduce its share of the greenhouse gas emissions that are causing it?
" ... farmers are uniquely vulnerable to the effects of climate change, but they are also strategically positioned to be part of the solution."
