Faculty & Research

Henry Jacoby

William F. Pounds Professor of Management Emeritus
Professor of Applied Economics
Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research

Biography | Publications

Henry (Jake) Jacoby is Co-Director of the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, which is a world leader in integration of the natural and social sciences and policy analysis in application to the threat of global climate change. He is director of the design and application of the social science component of the Joint Program's Integrated Global System Model — a comprehensive research tool for analyzing potential anthropogenic climate change and its social and environmental consequences — and he is a leader of MIT research and analysis of national climate policies and the structure of the international climate regime.

An undergraduate mechanical engineer at the University of Texas at Austin, he holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University where he also served on the faculties of the Department of Economics and the Kennedy School of Government. He has been Director of the Harvard Environmental Systems Program, Director of the MIT Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research, Associate Director of the MIT Energy Laboratory, and Chair of the MIT Faculty. He has made extensive contributions to the study of economics, policy and management in the areas of energy, natural resources and environment, writing widely on these topics including seven books. He currently serves on the Scientific Committee of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Program and on the Climate Research Committee of the U.S. National Research Council.