Asa Watten

Research Interests

Energy & environmental economics, public economics, industrial organization

Degrees

Michigan State University, Ph.D. Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics, 2021
Committee: Soren Anderson (chair), A. Justin Kirkpatrick, Jinhua Zhao, David Hennessy

The University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy, Masters of Public Policy with Honors, 2015
Honors thesis advisor: James Sallee

Carnegie Mellon University, B.S., Political Science, 2008

Research Positions

Postdoc, Environmental Protection Agency Office of Transportation and Air Quality / Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education, 2021—

Research Fellow, Environmental Protection Agency Office of Transportation and Air Quality / Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education, 2018-2021

Research Assistant: F. Lupi, Michigan State University, 2015-2020

Research Fellow, Energy Policy Institute at Chicago at The University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory, 2014

Research Assistant: H. S. Matthews and P. Fischbeck, Carnegie Mellon University, 2008

Working Papers

Asa Watten. “Capital Versus Output Subsidies with an Inconsistent Regulator”

Asa Watten. “Political Risk Reduces Solar Adoption in Renewable Portfolio Standards”

Asa Watten, Gloria Helfand, Soren T Anderson. “Attribute Production and Technical Change: Rethinking the Performance and Fuel Economy Trade-off for Light-duty Vehicles”

Asa Watten, Gloria Helfand, Christian Noice. “Consumer Preferences for Fuel Savings Technology in Light-duty Vehicles”

Asa Watten. “Crop Options: Modeling Intra-season Crop Growth and the Option to Abandon”

Works in Progress

Asa Watten. “Dynamic Innovation Incentives”

Asa Watten. “Pólya Urns for Dynamics with Applications to Agricultural Production”

Asa Watten. “Against the Wind? Hedonic Estimation Under Attribute Uncertainty”

Soren Anderson, Prabhat Barnwal, Dylan Brewer, Anna Terkelsen, and Alex Tybl, Asa Watten. “Re-Lighting Detroit’s Streets: Evidence from Property Values”

Chad Baily, Asa Watten, “Distributional Impacts of Truck Routes and Ports”

Presentations

2022 — Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (AERE) Annual Summer Conference — Capital vs Output Subsides with an Inconsistent Regulator

2022 — Eastern Economic Association — Capital vs Output Subsides with an Inconsistent Regulator

2022 — OSWEET — Capital vs Output Subsides with an Inconsistent Regulator

2021 — Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (AERE) Annual Summer Conference — Attribute Production and Technical Change: Rethinking the Performance and Fuel Economy Trade-off for Light-duty Vehicles

2020 — National Academy of Sciences — Attribute Production and Technical Change: Rethinking the Performance and Fuel Economy Trade-off for Light-duty Vehicles

2020 — Environmental Protection Agency Seminar — Attribute Production and Technical Change: Rethinking the Performance and Fuel Economy Trade-off for Light-duty Vehicles

2020 — Midwest Energy Fest (University of Chicago) — Political Risk Reduces Solar Adoption in Renewable Portfolio Standards

2019 — University of Michigan and Michigan State University (Summer Energy and Environmental Economics Workshop) — Attribute Production and Technical Change: Rethinking the Performance and Fuel Economy Trade-off for Light-duty Vehicles

2019 — Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (AERE) Annual Summer Conference — Rethinking the Performance and Fuel Economy Trade-off for Light-duty Vehicles

2019 — Agriculture, Food, and Resource Economics (AFRE) Symposium, Awarded 2018 Best Presentation — Crop Options

2018 — Presented at the Heartland Environmental and Resource Economics Workshop — Re-Lighting Detroit’s Streets: Impacts on Energy Use, Crime, and Property Values

2018 — Energy (University of California) — Re-Lighting Detroit’s Streets: Impacts on Energy Use, Crime, and Property Values

2018 — Agriculture, Food, and Resource Economics (AFRE) Seminar — Against the Wind?

2018 — Southern Economics Association Annual Meeting — Against the Wind?

2018 — Association of Agriculture and Applied Economics (AAEA) Annual Meeting — Crop Options

Teaching

AFRE 891 (instructor of record; graduate level), Computational Methods for Economists using R, 2018

Service and Awards

2021 — Dissertation Completion Fellowship 2018 — Best Presentation Award, AFRE Symposium

At Michigan State University
• Graduate Policy Committee, 2016-18
• President of AFRE Graduate Student Organization, 2018
• Vice-president of AFRE Graduate Student Organization 2017
• Hiring committees 2017-18

University of Chicago
• Co-chair of the Harris Energy Policy Association
• Chicago Environmental Policy Association

Associations
• American Economic Association (AEA)
• Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (AERE)
• Association of Agricultural and Applied Economics (AAEA)

Previous Life

CEO, Fossil Free Fuel, LLC, 2010–2013
• Deploying labor and capital to build a processing facility, retrofit diesel construction vehicles to burn biofuel, install three biodiesel fueling stations, expand waste oil collection service
• Collaboration with Economic Development Corporation of Braddock, City of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County Economic Development, and Department of Environmental Protection on infrastructure projects
• Grants totaling $770,552
• Awards: Penn Future Move It Award, Local Partner of the Year for “outstanding community service” by Mon Valley Initiative and the Braddock Economic Development Corporation

Project Associate, Penn State University Cooperative Extension, 2008–2010
• Research and grant writing for non-profits (all grants awarded) totaling $608,570

References

Soren T. Anderson (sta@msu.edu); Gloria Helfand (ghelfand@umich.edu); A. Justin Kirkpatrick (jkirk@msu.edu)