Main orientations and specific features | Career opportunities | Programmes

General Objectives

Energy warrants a cross-discipline, cross-sector study as its supply and use is centre-stage of heated political debate at all levels, in relation to economic growth, sustainable development, stability of financial markets, climate change, security, or technological solutions. Energy supply is and will remain a major development challenge for developing and developed countries alike.

PSIA’s International Energy program responds rigorously to a growing worldwide demand in energy expertise, with a cutting-edge curriculum, internship program, and active series of public lectures and events with industry and government leaders. Graduates enter the global job market with a strong international outlook and an incomparable understanding of complex interrelations between different issues, actors and technological solutions.

Scientific Advisor

Giacomo Luciani is the Scientific Advisor of the Master in International Energy.  He is also a Princeton University Global Scholar; Visiting Professor at PSIA and at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva. Giacomo Luciani founded and directed the Institute for Research on International Economics. His research interests include Political economy of the Middle East and North Africa and Geopolitics of energy. His work has focused primarily on the economic and political dynamics of rentier states and issues of development in the GCC countries.

Main orientations and specific feature

In short, energy supply and use will remain at the center of the political debate internationally as well as nationally. Creation of a single European energy market remains a major challenge for the Union, and has profound consequences on its external relations. Energy policies need to be adopted at the national and subnational level, and be coordinated internationally.

Politics and Economics of International Energy
Giacomo Luciani and Manfred Hafner
Economic growth requires constantly growing use of energy, and the availability of sufficient sources of energy on a global scale is not for granted. Energy – oil, gas, power – remains one of the biggest businesses, and maintains a strategic characterization that sets it aside from other economic sectors. As such, it attracts the attention of industrial, financial and political actors internationally. The course aims at providing students with the critical knowledge and skills to avoid superficial generalizations and simplifications – which unfortunately remain all too common.

Nuclear Energy
Bertrand Barré
Description:  Discovery of nuclear power  – The PWR, a typical nuclear reactor – Reactor families – World development of nuclear power – The nuclear fuel cycle – Accidents prevention, safety, security – Radioactive waste management – Weapons proliferation & Non-proliferation – Future nuclear power : Generation IV and controlled fusion – Nuclear power, democracy and public acceptance – Nuclear power in the global Developments/Environment dilemma.

Energy and Development
Giacomo Luciani
Description:   A critical assessment of the resource curse and rentier state theories. Is oil an obstacle to democratisation? What are the political implications of alternative energy sources, including renewable energy sources distributed generation, nuclear energy? The course will focus primarily on domestic politics but international influences and governance will also be considered.

Network Energies
Paolo Natali
Natural Gas and Electricity are so-called network forms of energy, and are often treated together as they share similar features. The course is going to describe both industries from exploration and production all the way down to end-user consumption, and point out these features. The main focus will be on politics, but the politics of energy are invariably linked to the economics of it. The natural gas industry and how it works. What is upstream and where? Transport: economics of pipelines and LNG, why regulated networks, why liberalization? Gas markets. Gas balancing and the role of storage. The electricity industry and how it works. Power generation; network issues, markets and real-time balancing; distribution, retail and micro-generation. Sources and the changing mix.

Energy Policies
Christian Egenhofer
Description: Energy is a strategic commodity, which is fundamental to all (economic) activity. The overwhelming importance of the energy sector – as opposed to other sectors – justifies a separate policy.  Contrary to other policies such as macro, environment or trade where national policies tend to converge to some kind of “international best-practice”, energy policies remain extremely divergent if one looks at different countries even within the EU left alone outside the EU.  This course aims at providing students with an overview on the ‘diversity’ of energy policies and their driving forces.  Principal focus will be the EU energy policy and its interaction with member states policies.  Within the context of the EU’s external energy policy, comparison to non-EU energy policies will be undertaken.

Energy Players and Strategies
Leila Benali
This course aims at describing the various players which are active in the energy sector. The goal is to explain the economic, geopolitical, social and technological stakes in the sector. The conference cycle will describe the big challenges facing today’s energy decision-makers depending on their position and their nature (government or private player, a major or service company…etc). We will shed light on how these questions translate in the oil, gas and electricity sectors.

Financing of Energy Projects
International energy projects are among the largest and most challenging that seek financing from the international financial system. The structure of the financial package can make or break projects, and no project is credible until its financing is arranged. Multiple sources are tapped and techniques used to finance energy projects, and fundamentally different strategies are common in different sections of the industry. The course will review the broad range of available solutions and discuss which is most appropriate depending on project typology.

Energy Markets
Bassam Fattouh
Energy markets have seen the growing participation of financial intermediaries and investors, and the time when oil prices were effectively controlled by international oil companies or Opec is long past. The course will review the functioning and tools of major oil and gas markets, spot and futures, physical or paper. It will review the electricity and carbon markets. It will introduce the debate on the efficiency of these markets and the relative role of speculation versus fundamentals in the determination of prices. Finally, proposals for market regulation of reform will be introduced critically.

Energy Economics
Jan-Horst Keppler
This course is designed to give the required background in micro and macroeconomics to all students that do not already have it. Price formation in competitive, oligopolistic and monopolistic markets. Alternative concepts of cost. Resource rent and Hotelling’s rule. Elasticity of demand and supply of energy relative to price or income. Macroeconomic impact of price changes of energy sources, notably oil. Profit maximization short term vs. long term.

Renewable Energy Sources and Rational Use of Energy
Manfred Hafner
Expectations on the future role of renewable sources of energy are very high, but are scenarios of decarbonisation realistic? This course will review the promises and pitfalls of individual renewable energy sources alternatives, in view of allowing full critical understanding of the conditions under which these may come to play a truly important role in global energy supplies.

Access to energy resources: the dynamic of states and companies
John Gault
Access to energy resources is regulated by specific legislation in all jurisdictions. The course covers major typologies of oil and gas laws and correspondingly of oil and gas contracts. The evolution of relations and bargaining strength between host governments and international oil companies and cycles of conflict/cooperation will be analyzed. Conflict management tools, including arbitration, will be discussed.

Energy Security
Paolo Natali
When and how energy security first emerged as a problem, when it was first defined, the different ways it was tackled over time. The course covers security of infrastructure, security of supply and security of demand. Special attention is given to where energy security fits in the European Union's "triangle" of energy policy priorities: sustainability, security and market development. NATO’s proposed role in the context of energy security.

Geopolitics of energy in select regions
Various
Energy is intensely geopolitical and interrelates with regional power equilibria, relations and logistical realities. It is not possible to cover all regions in a single course, but at least three regions will be discussed in depth.

Career opportunities

Governments, financial institutions, policy studies, think tanks and the media seek professionals with sufficient technical knowledge of energy issues to raise the debate. Energy companies, increasingly numerous and diverse, need public policy experts to advise on political and social acceptability of technological solutions and business strategies. Career openings include private enterprises, research institutes, international organizations, banks, consulting and multinational firms.

Programmes 2012-2013

• Rentrée pédagogique 2012-2013
• Fall courses | Download Planning
• Spring courses semesters 2 and 4 | Download Planning
• Fiche PSIA Master in International Energy - 2011-2012

Contacts

Scientific Advisor: Pr. Giacomo Luciani

Academic Advisor: Ms. Dania Del Ben
Office hours by appointment: Tuesday 14h30/17h Wednesday 10h/13h Friday 10h/13h

Academic Assistant: Ms. Ingrid Desauguste
Secretariat open Monday/Tuesday/Thursday 9h30-12h45 14h15-16h45. Wednesday/Friday 9h30-12h45