Sébastien POSTIC, Phd
Research Fellow – Public finance, DevelopmentSébastien is a Project Manager at I4CE, where his research areas mainly focus on taxation and public spending, both in terms of climate efficiency and contribution to the fight against poverty. He joined I4CE after a Franco-Chilean doctoral thesis dedicated to the development of a regional energy planning tool for South America. He also worked on the evolution of the South American energy mix in response to the commitments of the Paris Agreement (NDCs), competition between energy and forestry sectors for mitigation in South America, and on the medium-long-term prospects of Smart Grids and Smart Buildings in Europe as part of the European Climate and Energy package.
Sébastien is a graduate engineer from France’s École Polytechnique and holds an Advanced Master’s from MINES ParisTech, and a double doctorate from MINES ParisTech / University of Chile.
Last contributions
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02/07/2024
Climate Report
Social and Climate Budget Tagging: Insights from Indonesia
Attention is growing to the need to tackle climate and social issues jointly. Indeed, both climate change and climate policies affect social issues such as poverty, inequality, or access to healthcare. A well-known example is that of carbon pricing, a climate policy which can have regressive effects in some contexts. As another example, climate change induced heatwaves are disproportionately likely to impact poorer individuals who typically have more constrained access to healthcare, physical jobs in outdoor conditions, and through indirectly driving up food prices. To foster an effective and sustainable transition to low-carbon and resilient economies, policymakers need to ensure individuals do not lose more from climate policies than they already lose from the effects of climate change, but instead benefit from them. -
08/02/2024
Climate Report
Money, money, money: Financing plans for the climate transition
France should publish mid-year its first multi-annual strategy for financing the ecological transition. This is a long way from the first 2015 climate strategy, which barely touched funding aspects. And it is good news. We at I4CE believe that such plans are essential tools to support the transition to low-emission, climate-resilient economies. Credible, multi-year public spending targets help to embark the private sector and the funders of public action (debt holders, international donors) in the transition, and redirect financial flows as demanded by the Paris Agreement. Comprehensive financing plans also avoid simplistic approaches based on case-by-case project appraisal on the basis of limited cost-benefit considerations, which can ultimately result in significant additional costs. -
22/11/2023
Blog post
Carbon prices: the winds of change
After several years of strong growth, the revenue generated by carbon pricing mechanisms (carbon taxes or markets) worldwide, as reported in our 2023 edition of the Global Carbon Accounts, stabilized at nearly USD 100 billion. This stabilization could not be more deceptive. The future has rarely been so uncertain for carbon prices, caught between very strong opposing trends, and the next two years could mark a major turning point, for good or bad, for the use of these climate policy instruments worldwide. -
22/11/2023
Climate Brief
Global carbon accounts in 2023
What are the carbon taxes and markets around the world, the range of carbon prices, the revenues generated, the emissions covered by these mechanisms? Find the answers to these questions, and many more, in the new edition of the Global Carbon Accounts from I4CE.
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09/11/2022
Climate Report
The economic implications of the transition to a low-carbon and resilient economy: an LTS dashboard for Finance Ministers
Long term national climate strategies, such as Long-Term Strategies (LTS) published to the UNFCCC, are key documents developed by governments to envision the transition to a low-carbon and climate resilient economy at the 2050 (or later) time-horizon. As of the beginning of COP 27 in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt, on November 2022, 55 countries had submitted an LTS to the UNFCCC, answering renewed calls for countries to develop such strategies at COP 26. It is expected that additional LTS will be published shortly. -
21/09/2022
Climate Brief
Global carbon accounts in 2022
Carbon revenues were nearly USD 100 billion in 2021. This represents a more than 80% increase year-on-year (USD 53.1 billion in 2020, USD 97.7 billion in 2021). This increase is largely driven by the rise in allowance prices on the European carbon market, which exceeded the symbolic threshold of EUR 100/tCO2 for the first time in the summer of 2022. -
19/01/2022
Blog post
Turn green budgets into green AND social budgets?
Number of climate public policies have social impacts, and conversely. To foster the consideration of these joint climate and social effects in the development of public policies, actors are calling to turn the increasingly popular climate budget tagging exercises into climate AND social budget tagging exercises. Is it a good idea? Chloé Boutron and Solène Metayer, who attempted the exercise, are sharing their insights. -
21/10/2021
Climate Report
Global Carbon Accounts in 2021
Explicit carbon pricing systems - a tax or a carbon market - continue to develop around the world. In the 2021 edition of its Global Carbon Accounts, I4CE presents the main trends and provides an overview of these public policies ... -
14/10/2021
Climate Report
The Good, the Bad and the Unclear : Environmental Budget Tagging
This study takes stock on the experience of some twenty countries and several international development institutions in Environmental Budget Tagging. It identifies the expected benefits and the conditions to achieve them : take into account the measures that are unfavorable to the environment, consider the outcomes of assessed measures and not only their intention, repeat the exercise over time and fit it into the existing administrative culture and processes… -
05/10/2020
Blog post
France’s Green Budget: What’s Next ?
A few days after the publication of France's 2021 budget bill, and before any debates in parliament, the government released an environmental assessment of it. This assessment, often referred to as the "green budget", is an important step forward for the transparency of public action, according to Marion Fetet and Sébastien Postic from I4CE. Nevertheless, they suggest improvements to be made to the scope of the budget analyzed or to the classification of certain expenditures. And they call for making the green budget a real tool for greening the budget. -
23/09/2020
Blog post
“Green budgeting”: paths to creating real added value
Few green budgeting initiatives have led to concrete reforms or revisions of priority investments. How can we move from simple theoretical exercises to concrete action for the environment? This is the question asked by Sébastien Postic of I4CE, Oskar Lecuyer of AFD and Jennifer Doherty-Bigara of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). -
14/05/2020
Climate Brief
Global Carbon Account in 2020
Explicit carbon pricing systems - a tax or a carbon market - continue to develop around the world. In the 2020 edition of its Global Carbon Accounts, I4CE presents the main trends and provides an overview of these public policies: the countries that have adopted them, the sectors covered, the price levels, the revenues generated and what is being done with them. Find all this information in graphics. -
01/10/2019
Climate Report
A first 360-degree climate assessment of France’s State budget
The vote on the state budget is a key moment in the fight against climate change. In France,more than 250 budget measures have been identified: expenditures, tax exemptions, taxes, all of which have a significant influence, upward or downward, on national greenhouse gas emissions. 250 reasons to keep a close eye on the state budget. […] -
23/08/2019
Blog post
“Using Carbon revenues”, new report from the World Bank, AFD and I4CE
The recent proliferation of carbon pricing schemes and the increase in associated prices have led to a significant increase in carbon-related revenues. As of May 1, 2019, 25 carbon taxes and 26 emissions trading schemes (ETS) were in operation around the world. Jurisdictions covered by one or more explicit carbon prices account for about 60% of global GDP. -
12/05/2019
Climate Brief
Carbon Tax : France can learn from foreign experiences to move forward
France is by no means the only country with difficulties – that is an understatement – in introducing an accepted carbon tax. And not the only one to have taken up the challenge of a public policy leading to higher energy prices for households and businesses. In 2018, the World Bank identified 29 countries or […] -
17/12/2018
Blog post
COP24: the challenge of implementation
COP24 in Katowice just ended and was marked by the difficult adoption of a package of practical rules - the Katowice Climate Package - on transparency, the content of national contributions or their revision. It was also a COP marked by deep concerns about the willingness of Signatory Countries to increase their climate ambition in the coming years. Currently, countries' commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will lead to global warming well above 2°C, the threshold above which our climate would jump into the unknown. -
03/12/2018
Blog post
I4CE at COP24 in Katowice, Poland: list of events and publications
The I4CE team will be present throughout the two weeks of negotiations, in order to present its latest achievements in about ten side-events, whether on carbon pricing, climate investment tracking, climate action by financial actors or carbon certification of innovative practices in the land sector. Please see below the full list of events organized by I4CE - or where I4CE will be participating. -
09/11/2018
Blog post
Environmental taxes, a key issue for I4CE
Environmental taxation is a hot topic in France right now, at a moment where increasing fuel prices have put the carbon tax and other green fiscal instruments under the spotlight. is contributing to the discussion on how to strengthen support for environmental taxes: By quantifying the revenues generated by carbon pricing schemes in France […] -
04/10/2018
Climate Brief
Carbon pricing across the world: how to efficiently spend growing revenues?
This climate brief highlights that while there is an acceleration of carbon pricing policy implementation, associated revenues are on the rise (USD 32 billion in 2017). This increase raises the issue of the use of revenues. I4CE distinguishes between 4 main uses of carbon revenues: Investment in low-carbon projects; Allocation to the general budget; Reduction […] -
11/07/2018
Blog post
I4CE supports Tunisia in its carbon pricing strategy
I4CE has designed a capacity building programme to facilitate the implementation of carbon pricing policies in Tunisia. -
17/04/2018
Climate Brief
Global Carbon Account 2018
I4CE‘s Global Carbon Account 2018 presents key trends regarding the implementation of explicit carbon pricing policies throughout the world in 2018. 5 key trends in 2018 (Too) Few jurisdictions have implemented an explicit carbon price : as of April 1, 2018, 46 countries and 26 provinces or cities have adopted carbon pricing policies ; […] -
01/11/2017
Blog post
Call for practitioner’s insights – Study on the use of carbon revenues
This survey aims to gather input from all stakeholders, including governments, to understand their perspective on how to use revenues generated by carbon pricing policies. The project team aims to examine how carbon pricing revenues can be used to integrate climate into tax reforms and how the experience and best practices of developed countries in […] -
18/10/2017
Climate Brief
Fossil fuel subsidy reforms: state of play and ways forward
BACKGROUND: Fossil fuel subsidies are incompatible with the low carbon energy transition SUMMARY: Promoting the production and consumption of fossil fuels through subsidies is incompatible with the Paris Agreement on climate change. While G20 countries have committed to phase out “inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption” since 2009, the progress towards reform […] -
09/10/2017
Climate Brief
Landscape of carbon prices in 2017
In September 2017, I4CE updated its database on carbon pricing policies. This panorama presents key trends regarding the implementation of explicit carbon pricing policies at the regional and national level in 2017. A world map, a detailed table and a graph provide comprehensive information on the jurisdictions that have implemented or plan to implement explicit […] -
18/09/2017
Blog post
Carbon pricing in Morocco : training workshop on 13 – 15 September at the Environnement Ministry
At the invitation of the Ministry of the Environment and its Secretariat for Sustainable Development and supported by the Partnership of Market Readiness of the World Bank , I4CE assists representatives of different ministries and economic sectors to understand the implementation of carbon pricing policies in Morocco with the aim at achieving their climate targets set in […] -
14/06/2017
Blog post
Renewable energies in China: From a proactive political approach to bottlenecks in the field
Publication in ID4D blog Sébastien Postic, Charlotte Vailles et Marion Afriat from I4CE’s Industry Energy and Climate team have recently published blog post on the Ideas for Development blog coordinated by Agence Francaise de Développement. The deployment of renewable energies is a challenge for all countries. It requires a major transformation in existing infrastructure and regulations, which needs to […]