Professor Robin Burgess has been awarded a prestigious European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Grant. He is among 255 outstanding research leaders this year to have been awarded what is some of the EU’s most competitive funding by the ERC.

Robin Burgess, Professor of Economics and Director of the IGC, was awarded ERC funding for his project Innovation and the Environment.

Professor Burgess said: “It is becoming ever more apparent that the way out of the tension between growth and climate change is innovation. These innovations will not only have to slow the emissions that are driving climate change but also protect people from the unfolding damages. This project will shed light on three major questions: (1) how can we enhance resilience to climate change?; (2) how can we design smart conservation policies?; and (3) how can we promote innovation and diffusion of clean energy?

The support of the ERC is transformational as it helps to catalyse a movement to place environmental issues at the heart of economics and economic policy. Doing this is critical to bringing human activity and the natural environment into greater balance and is central to the future or our planet. Pushing this movement forward will require collaborations with a range of organisations and researchers. I am deeply deeply grateful to the support that the ERC has provided to me over the years and am excited to take this work forward.”   

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