Dear Students and Faculty Members,

We are pleased to invite you to Workshop on ‘Financial modeling and real options for innovative low-carbon projects’, to be delivered by Dr. Anurag Gumber, Assistant Professor, Climate Infrastructure & Finance, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.  

Please note that this workshop is intended for participants across all levels of experience. In addition, a second workshop on Climate Innovation Financing, geared toward PhD candidates and participants interested in pursuing research, will be organized within the next 10 days following the first workshop. Interested participants are welcome to attend this workshop as well.

We warmly encourage all students and faculty members to attend and participate in the discussion.

Kindly use this link to RSVP and let us know if you will be able to attend the session. https://forms.gle/jbomcFp48pWZnKW99

Workshop Details

Workshop Title : ‘Financial modeling and real options for innovative low-carbon projects’

Speaker Name : Dr. Anurag Gumber, Assistant Professor, Climate Infrastructure & Finance, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

Event Address: To be confirmed

Date and Time:  Tentatively before 17th January (exact date to be confirmed)

**Tea and snacks will be served

About Speaker : Anurag Gumber is an Assistant Professor in Climate Infrastructure & Finance at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Carbon Neutrality & Climate Change Thrust). He obtained his Ph.D. in climate policy and finance from ETH Zurich in 2024. He researches at the intersection of technology innovation, asset finance, and infrastructure development. His research investigates how low-carbon energy technologies mature from a financing point of view, how financial actors such as banks and institutional investors can increase investments to low-carbon projects, and how the development processes for building such low-carbon projects can be derisked. Prior to obtaining his Ph.D., Anurag worked in industry for over seven years advising several governments, development banks and infrastructure investors. He holds a Master’s degree in Public Administration from Harvard University, a Bachelor’s degree from Birla Institute of Technology & Science Pilani, and the CFA designation. 

Abstract

Decarbonization policy can be summarized as a journey up the technology abatement curve. Cheaper low-carbon innovations are financed before more expensive ones, with targets used to propel innovation and learning in hard-to-abate sectors to bring down future abatement costs of costlier technologies. This feedback in cost reductions while learning places project developers in precarious situation – invest now or wait until technology matures and costs reduce. This workshop imparts modeling skills to attendees as they learn to recognize real option value embedded in innovative technologies and how that value can be influenced by policy choices.

Candidates are requested to carry a laptop and functioning license of Microsoft Excel. First 1.5 hours of the workshop will be spent on fundamentals of real option pricing, followed by modeling of dairy industry decarbonization.

For any queries, please contact: Ashwini Mudgal

(ashwinim.cstaff@iitd.ac.in) or Ekta Baranwal

(ekta1988.cstaff@iitd.ac.in)