Research

Working Papers

1. Flooded House or Underwater Mortgage? The Macrofinancial Implications of Climate Change and Adaptation 

Tinbergen Institute Discussion Paper TI 2023-014/IV, (available on SSRN). Revised: May, 2026!

Finalist, Young Economist Prize, European Central Bank (2024),

Best Student Paper Award, CEPR European Conference on Household Finance (2023),

Best Single-Authored Paper Award, European Sustainable Finance PhD Workshop (2023).

Abstract:  I study how climate change affects housing markets, mortgage credit, and private adaptation in a general-equilibrium overlapping-generations model. Climate events damage housing and degrade land, which is inelastically supplied. While exposure to future climate risk lowers expected resale values, realized climate damages reduce effective housing supply, raising house prices over time. In frictionless markets, forward-looking prices support efficient adaptation. However, credit-constrained households underinvest in resilience, implying that price signals alone are insufficient. Unequal adaptation amplifies wealth inequality and accelerates land degradation, tightening credit constraints and widening the adaptation gap. I show that a shift toward landlord-based ownership can restore efficiency.

Selected conferences: EFA (2026); FIRS 2026 (Miami); ETH Zurich Workshop on Sustainability Economics and Finance at the Climate-Biodiversity Nexus (invited speaker); NBER SI 2025 (Household Finance); SED 2025 (Copenhagen);  AEA-ASSA 2025 (poster session, San Francisco);  ECB Forum on Central Banking 2024 (Young Economist Competition); NY Fed & NYU Fed Climate Finance Conference 2024 (poster); MoFiR 2024 (London); CEPR-ESSEC-Luxembourgh Conference on Sustainable Financial Intermediation  2024 (Luxembourgh);  HEC Paris Finance PhD Workshop (2024); CEPR Household Finance 2023 (Turin); IWH-Fin-Fire Conference 2023 (Halle); Woman in Central Banking Workshop 2023 (Norges Bank); IPWSD at Columbia University in the City of New York 2023; CEPR Paris Symposium 2023 (poster session); European Sustainable Finance PhD Workshop 2023 (Utrecht). 

Invited seminars: Job talk Northwestern Kellogg School of Management; Stockholm School of Economics; Nova SBE; Bocconi; Frankfurt School of Finance & Management; Copenhagen Business School; BI Norwegian Business School; Vienna School of Economics and Business; KU Leuven; other Oxford University (Economics); Bonn Finance Seminar Series; CEPR Virtual Seminar on Climate Economics; HEC-HKUST Sustainable Finance Webinar; Transatlantic Seminar on Environmental and Energy Economics; Massachusetts Institute of Technology  (Sustainable Urbanization Lab); Imperial College London (formal PhD seminar); University of Mannheim; De Nederlandsche Bank.

NBER Summer Institute presentation: Youtube (2:00:19 - 2:21:43). 

Media coverage: VoxTalks Economics 

2. Funding the Fittest? Pricing Climate Transition Risk in the Corporate Bond Market 

with M.A. Boermans & M.J.G. Bun. 

De Nederlandsche Bank Working Paper No. 797 (available on SSRN). Revised: October, 2025.

Abstract:  We study whether climate transition risk affects the cost of debt and how corporate bond investors value green innovation. Using confidential bond holdings and global firm data, we find a positive transition risk premium. This premium is significantly lower for emission-intensive firms engaging in green innovation, suggesting investors perceive green innovations to carry option value. Institutional investors, particularly mutual funds, exhibit higher demand for bonds issued by transitioning firms. Our findings suggest that risk pricing is the channel through which environmental performance influences yield spreads, highlighting the role of risk-bearing investors to channel capital to firms central to the transition. 

Selected conferences: Dutch Sustainable Finance Workshop (2026); FIRS 2025 (Seoul); IWH-Fin-Fire Conference 2025 (Halle); Econometric Society World Congres 2025 (Seoul)*; GRASFI 2024 (Singapore); ICFAB 2024 (Southampton)*;  RCEA International Conference in Economics, Econometrics, and Finance (London); IAAE 2024 (Thessaloniki)*.

Invited seminars: Cambridge Judge School of Business; E-Axes Forum Young Scholars' Webinar; Tilburg University; Robeco Asset Management; ESCB  Research Cluster Climate Change*;  University of Utrecht (School of Economics)*.

Webinar:  E-Axes Forum Young Scholars' Webinar.

Policy notes: E-Axes Policy Brief  ·  De Nederlandsche Bank  ·  SUERF  ·  E-Axes Digest  ·  VBA Journaal.

Media coverage: Bloomberg. 

3. Political Economy of Climate Change Adaptation

with E.C. Perotti & F. Van der Ploeg. 

CEPR Discussion Paper DP18959, CESifo Working Paper No. 10961, Tinbergen Institute Discussion Paper TI 2024-013/IV,  (available on SSRN). Revised: March, 2026.

Abstract: We examine how political support for climate adaptation evolves as climate risk and inequality rise. In an economy with heterogeneous beliefs and incomes, households vote on publicly funded adaptation. As extreme events accumulate, beliefs about climate risk converge, and the economic value of protection grows. These forces generate a political tipping point: young sceptics—facing rising housing scarcity and future damages—shift toward stronger adaptation, realigning with old realists and triggering a discrete increase in public intervention. Yet even after this political shift, adaptation remains below the social optimum due to a ``tragedy of the horizon'' effect. Rising inequality can induce a second tipping point, but its effect is ambiguous, as gradual inequality depresses adaptation through political backlash, while rapidly widening inequality pushes voters toward greater protection. 

Selected conferences:  EJPE-CEPR-Bocconi Political Economy 2024 (Naples); SURED 2024  (Monte Verità); CEPR Paris Symposium 2023.

Policy notes: VoxEU.

4. Unequal Incentives: The Distributional and Emission Consequences of the Green Housing Transition

with M.Droës.

Tinbergen Institute Discussion Paper TI 2024-026/IV,  (available on SSRN). Revised: February, 2026.

Abstract:  We examine the pace of household transitions to greener housing and the distributional impacts on energy savings, wealth, and residential CO2 emissions. Using unique Dutch survey data covering all types of energy-efficiency home improvements, combined with households’ stated motivations and administrative records on utility expenditures, income, and wealth, we show that low-income households are less likely to reside in energy-efficient homes or undertake improvements, mainly due to affordability constraints. Higher-income households more frequently cite financial returns and climate considerations as primary motivations. Nearly 40% of unrealized mitigation potential is concentrated among low-income households, highlighting the potential for targeted policies to reduce both emissions and inequality simultaneously.

Selected conferences: AREUEA-ASSA 2025 (San Francisco); AREUEA International 2024 (Curaçao); ERES 2024 (Gdánsk)*. 

Invited seminars: Roma Tre `Inequality in Rome' Seminar Series; Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy (EZK); Dutch Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations (BZK)*; De Nederlandsche Bank; ABN AMRO Bank; Dutch Competition Authority (ACM).

Policy notes: ESB (in Dutch).

5. Waiting to Adapt? Complementarities and Investment Irreversibility

New! (available on SSRN).

Abstract: I develop a model in which households dynamically invest in irreversible climate adaptation. Irreversibility makes early investment risky, as households may invest before uncertainty about future climate risk is resolved. While adaptation reduces future damages, its returns depend on aggregate investment, creating strategic complementarities. I show that the interaction between irreversibility and complementarities can lead to inefficiently delayed adaptation, even when early investment has positive net returns, resulting in persistently low levels of adaptation. These inefficiencies may be mitigated by adaptation mandates and concentrated ownership of climate-exposed assets, while state-contingent insurance can increase delay by crowding out early investment.