WECC Content Team
Course selection is approaching, and many MBAs are looking for classes that connect climate, markets, and the financial mechanics of the energy transition. One such course is “Climate and Financial Markets”, taught by Professors Arthur van Benthem and Mirko Heinle, which offers a rigorous and applied look at how climate risk shapes firms, investor behavior, and capital flows. With updated content for this academic year and an interactive format that blends policy, asset pricing, and corporate finance, the course gives students a practical foundation in the tools and market structures that matter for careers in energy, finance, and sustainability.
Climate and Financial Markets (ACCT/BEPP 7640)
Instructors: Professors Arthur van Benthem and Mirko Heinle
What you’ll learn
Climate and Financial Markets is about understanding how climate change is reshaping capital flows. Professors van Benthem and Heinle walk students through how climate risks—both physical and regulatory—affect firms, traditional financial markets (including equity, debt, insurance, mortgages, and real-estate markets), and markets for energy, electric vehicles, and data centers. There will be emphasis on how carbon markets (both compliance and voluntary), renewable energy finance, and executive incentives all connect to decarbonization. You’ll also look at disclosures and data – how ESG ratings, greenwashing, and carbon reporting affect firm value and investor trust.
Inside the classroom
The course is interactive and applied, and the professors will teach parts of the course in tag-team style. Lectures mix policy, asset pricing, and corporate finance with in-class experiments, simulations and guest panels with investors and market practitioners. The course will provide valuable opportunities for networking between students and guest speakers. You’ll also participate in a carbon-trading simulation, analyze green bond cases, and study renewable energy project finance and contracts.
Who should take it (and why)
– If you’re interested in how markets price climate risk: The early modules cover how equity, debt, real estate, and insurance markets incorporate physical and transition risks, blending CAPM intuition with empirical evidence. It’s perfect for those heading into asset management, risk advisory, or consulting roles that require insights on how climate exposure shows up in valuations and market pricing.
– If you want to understand the financial plumbing of the energy transition: A multi-week block on renewable energy finance and project structures, covering tax credits, tax equity, PPAs, securitization, renewable energy certificate trading, and dealmaking, builds practical fluency for careers in project finance, infrastructure investing, or utilities strategy.
– If you’re drawn to carbon and green-certificate markets: The section on carbon trading, voluntary offsets, and green certificates (complete with an extensive simulated market exercise) equips you to understand how policy design and market behavior shape pricing. The professors have an ambitious research agenda on carbon markets and will bring their latest insights to class. This is highly relevant for consulting, trading, or roles at firms engaged in environmental commodities.
– If you’re thinking in decades, not quarters: The course closes by stretching the time horizon, looking at how energy companies rethink strategy and capital allocation amid long-run climate risk, and how investors value cash flows that extend decades into the future. You’ll examine the economics of discounting, the social cost of carbon, and the evolving role of energy and tech firms in a decarbonizing world, including the challenges and promises of data center growth and sustainable computing.
