The Five Most Influential Energy and Climate Studies of 2012

Ideas matter. Or at least Council on Foreign Relations fellows like to believe that: otherwise, we’d be wasting a lot of our time. With that in mind, I canvassed some of the smartest observers of the energy and climate worlds – scholars, advocates, journalists, businesspeople, and policymakers – for their picks for the most influential studies, reports, in-depth articles, or books of the year in the field. Then I threw my own judgement into the mix.

Without further ado, here are my picks for the five most influential energy or climate publications of 2012. This isn’t a list of “the best” analyses of the year – it’s a collection of those that have had the most impact. Read them if you haven’t yet. You’re already feeling their consequences in any case.

Honorable mentions include Richard Muller’s “BEST” study that confirmed global warming trends, which made a big splash but seems to have since faded; the IHS study that estimated a gain of 600,000 jobs from shale gas (technically ineligible because it was published in December 2011) – its estimates made it into the president’s State of the Union address this year, and seem to have influenced White House thinking on natural gas more broadly; the Breakthrough Institute’s work establishing the federal government’s historical role in promoting shale gas technology, which also made it into the State of the Union, and has helped remind many that federal support remains vital to energy innovation; and the “Darkest Before Dawn” study from three McKinsey consultants that projected widespread grid-parity for solar power within five years, influencing opinion among an important segment of people who think about where clean energy is heading.

And finally an invitation to chime in in the comments section: What did this list miss?