This paper presents a method for estimating treatment effects of local climate shocks when regions trade with each other. Because trade creates spillovers, comparing the change in outcomes of regions with different exposure to shocks leads to biased estimates. We model these between-region spillovers using standard assumptions from international trade theory, and develop a model-consistent strategy for estimating key parameters and deriving counterfactuals. We use our estimation strategy to revisit the literature on the impact of climate change on gross output. We find that accounting for trade spillovers yields substantially larger climate damage projections.
Work in progress
[JMP] Climate induced Congestion in Ports: General Equilibrium Consequences on Transportation and Trade
This paper studies how climate change affects international trade through its impact on ports and maritime transportation. Rising sea levels threaten port operations in a spatially heterogeneous way, driven by geographically uneven climate dynamics. Because container shipping operates as a global network, these local disruptions propagate globally, beyond the ports directly exposed. I combine high-frequency satellite shipping data with sea weather observations to estimate how high water levels disrupt port operations and thereby raise transportation costs. I embed these estimates in a general equilibrium model of international trade with a shipping network. The model features port congestion, driven by traffic and climate conditions, that raises shipping costs. I introduce economies of scale in shipping,
arising from cargo pooling, to rationalize the network’s sparsity; the network structure then responds endogenously to changes in climate conditions, amplifying their effects. Century-end sea level rise projections indicate that ports will face water level increases of up to 1.3 meters by 2100. I find that it leads to a widespread rise of transportation costs, by 3.5% to 5.9% on trade-weighted average across country pairs, and a 1.0% to 1.6% reduction in global welfare, depending on the climate scenario. These results uncover a new component of the climate damage function: the sensitivity of trade costs to climate change. I also find that, as a consequence of economies of scale and the resulting endogenous network structure, general equilibrium forces dominate the direct shock: a country’s welfare loss depends more on its position within the trade network than on the exposure of its own ports.
Policy reports
Housing Energy Performance and Energy Consumption: Insights from Banking Data, with Gabrielle Fack, Julien Fournel, Flavie Maisonneuve and Ariane Salem – Focus #103, Conseil d’Analyse Economique, January 2024. Available here (in French).
Measuring the heterogeneous effects of inflation on households, with Xavier Jaravel and Madeleine Péron – Focus #99, Conseil d’Analyse Economique, July 2023. Available here (in French).
Academic presentations
[2026] IP Paris Seas and Ocean Forum (poster); UC Berkeley Trade Lunch; UC Davis Nature Policy Lab; UC Berkeley Climate Change Economics Lunch (egg timer); UC Berkeley Environmental, Energy, and Resource Economics seminar; Midwest International Trade & Theory Conference (Ohio State); Rocky Mountain Empirical Trade Conference (Banff, Canada); Toulouse 15th Energy and Climate Economics Conference; RIEF network conference (Paris-Saclay); Second Paris-Saclay Conference on Trade and the Environment; Dartmouth Internal Trade Seminar.
[2025] CREST PhD seminar; Columbia IPWSD (New York); PSE Doctorissimes (Paris); LSE Workshop for Early Career Women In Economic Geography and Spatial Economics (London); LSE Environment Camp (London); Warwick PhD Conference (Coventry); EAERE Annual Conference (Bergen); Workshop in International Economic Networks (Vienna); JIE Summer School (Munich); LSE Environment Week (London); Kiel trade talk; PSE Globalization Shipping and Trade workshop (Paris), Crest-Insee workshop; CEPR Paris Symposium (poster)
[2024] FAERE PhD workshop, EAERE Early Career workshop, CREST PhD workshop