Ashley Jones, Communications Specialist at GHG Protocol, sat down with Danny Cullenward, Senior Fellow at the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy at the University of Pennsylvania and member of Greenhouse Gas Protocol’s Independent Standards Board (ISB) to discuss how his interdisciplinary background in law, economics, and climate science informs his work. They spoke about the move from voluntary to mandatory frameworks, insights from his book Making Climate Policy Work and his work to ensure that climate policy is grounded both in sound science and practical outcomes.

What originally drew you to your career specialty, design and implementation of scientifically grounded climate policy?  

When I started college, I was planning to work in applied math and computer science. In my freshman year, I took a course with Steve Schneider, who ended up becoming my mentor and eventually my PhD advisor. He was one of the first generation of climate scientists to speak publicly about climate issues, and he was involved in the formation of what became the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change or IPCC.  

I always had a split identity between my interest in researching climate science and climate mitigation and working on the solutions to try and mitigate climate change. Over time, it became clear what I really cared most about was policy outcomes. I’m constantly learning about different areas of natural and social science that are involved in climate issues, so I bring those perspectives to policy debates and political discussions.

Outside of your professional credentials, how would you describe yourself?  

I have two young kids, so there's not a lot of space in my life outside of them. I'm always trying to learn more, and now a big part of my life is helping two young people learn – it's a full-time job these days. We read a lot together, and I love showing them books and TV shows that I used to love. I get to teach them how to think about the world and focus on two people who are constantly trying to learn.

What inspired you to apply for GHG Protocol’s Independent Standards Board?  

I read a paper by a good colleague of mine, Leehi Yona, who is a professor at Cornell Law School, about a set of policy changes in California that centered on how important the greenhouse gas accounting rules were and how politicized they had become. The paper helped me articulate something that I had been thinking about for a few years: the politics of climate policy are being adjudicated through accounting rules. We must recognize the importance of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol both for its historical role in voluntary climate action and its increasingly prominent role in the public policy world.

As governments begin to mandate and uptake these standards into compliance frameworks, I saw an opportunity to help strengthen outcomes and shape what is going to be an increasingly consequential area of work going forward.

How do you view your role on the Independent Standards Board?  

Training in an interdisciplinary field means you’re constantly learning. You move between disciplines, try to figure out core elements of technical disciplines, how different communities understand the knowledge they create and verify truth according to their disciplines and evidentiary traditions.

I view my main role as bringing that background and subject matter expertise in the places I have depth of knowledge. In the places where I don’t have as much depth, I view my role as trying to make sure that the ways we record definitions and the way we hear from different experts and stakeholders is grounded in a coherent discussion that speaks to the central elements of evidence in each of the disciplines that are affected.

Overall, I view my role as bringing science accountability and the ability to move between several different technical fields, recognizing that there are many members of the process and members of the board who have different areas of expertise. I represent the scientific community and the interaction with scientific evidence.

What changes in greenhouse gas accounting have you seen over the course of your career?  

The main change I’ve seen is that in the past, greenhouse gas accounting has largely been a voluntary corporate issue or something really bespoke to individual policy instruments. As things become more mandatory and more oriented towards compliance regimes, I’m seeing the stakes getting higher.  

I’m also seeing that across jurisdictions the same accounting issue will come up, so I see parallel debates in multiple jurisdictions. That’s really interesting from a research perspective and highlights the importance of good governance and a process that takes a hard look at controversial issues.

What have you read/listened to/watched recently that taught you something new?  

My kids recently started watching reruns of The Adventures of Pete & Pete. Growing up in the US in the 90s I thought it was a great show, but you never really know with nostalgia. Turns out it holds up really well, both for the respect the writers showed their audience and the doubts they seeded about the adult world.

How does your interdisciplinary background in both law and economics inform your approach to ensuring the scientific integrity of climate policy?

Both of these disciplines help me anticipate the consequences of different drafting decisions. I’m well equipped to think through the implications of a proposed idea or rule.  

A lot of what goes into greenhouse gas accounting is a lot like what judges do. There’s a lot of jurisprudence because it’s really a question of translating contested issues into outcomes and thinking through the implications and balancing them. There’s rarely an objectively correct answer that satisfies all issues. It’s usually a question of balance and trade-offs. That’s what judges do, so it resonates with the training I’ve had in law in particular.

Economics is a helpful tool to think through the implications. For example, if you set a certain rule, what are people likely to do in response to that rule? It’s one of the most important questions to think through when discussing contested accounting issues.

Some of the issues that are likely to come before the ISB have come up in legal or policy processes, so hopefully I'll have some familiarity with the issues and the different perspectives people bring to those debates.  

You co-wrote the book Making Climate Policy Work with David G. Victor. In the book, you argue that industrial policy and government-led strategies are best positioned to catalyze effective climate action. What makes these strategies more successful in practice?

There are two main elements of the book. The primary thesis was an explanation of why carbon pricing hasn't been as effective as we might have hoped it would be. The second argument was that industrial policy is more effective. The thing that ties those two claims together is that incumbency is really powerful. It is really hard to completely turn around a major industry without leadership at all levels. We make a case that government support through clear policy direction is really critical.  

The main analytical contribution of the book was to argue not that carbon pricing is a bad thing or doesn't have merits, but rather that policies that price the greenhouse gas emissions problem amplify the political economy problems of trying to move for higher ambition policies. Industrial policies that take a sector or business-specific approach often concentrate the political winners and the benefits of intentional government intervention without imposing the cost on a wide group of stakeholders who might oppose those changes. When you look at the major industries that have experienced profound change, the changes tend to be traceable to specific government interventions, rather than economy-wide programs. It’s not that economy-wide programs are bad, they just tend to not be as ambitious as we want to see.