Charles Komanoff

 

Areas of Expertise

Komanoff is a wide-ranging policy analyst respected for rigor and accuracy and renowned for his ability to "make numbers speak." See his professional biography. His specific knowledge areas follow:

 

Energy policy

  • energy efficiency and conservation
  • energy usage (by fuel, end-use, etc.)
  • macro trend analysis (the long-term picture)
  • electricity demand-side management
  • nuclear power history, viability and costs
  • coal pollution impacts and controls
  • fossil-fuel environmental and social costs
  • energy economics, incl. demand responsiveness (price-elasticity)
  • renewables, especially wind power

See especially these recent reports:

Transport policy

  • travel-demand management
  • road pricing: theory and practice
  • demand impacts of tolls, higher gas prices, etc. on vehicle use
  • costs of motor vehicle use: direct and "external"
  • fiscal subsidies to roads and autos
  • bicycling: usage, policies, potential, etc.
  • road safety, including crash data and morbidity (U.S. and worldwide)
  • macro trend analysis (the long-term picture)
  • un-bundling vehicle-use costs (e.g., parking cash-out, per-mile insurance)
  • alternatives to single-occupant vehicles
  • capacity-speed relationships
  • speed-mpg relationships
  • vehicular fuel efficiency

See especially these recent reports and articles:

Cost-Benefit and Risk Analysis

  • environmental and social costs of energy, esp. fossil fuels
  • environmental and social costs of transport, esp. motor vehicles
  • nuclear power societal risks and accident dangers
  • transport mortality and morbidity (drivers, bicyclists, pedestrians)
  • relative transport risks/safety in USA vis-a-vis Europe, China, etc.
  • critiques of U.S. safety paradigm (its emphasis on crash mitigation over danger reduction, individual safety over social safety, and intransitive over transitive risk)
  • bicycling safety: helmet promotion vs. safety-in-numbers
  • health risks (opportunity costs) of not cycling
  • road traffic accident analysis

See especially these recent reports and articles:

Noise

  • noise regulations
  • noise code enforcement
  • sound level measurement (w/ state-of-the-art 'Type 2' sound-level meter)
  • noise costs of jet skis, incl. how jet skis differ from other motorized watercraft
  • noise impacts of wind turbines
  • noise impacts of telecom hotels (Internet server 'farms')
  • how decibels work; how to quantify and compare noise levels

See especially these recent reports and articles:

Bicycling Policy

  • environmental benefits of bicycling and walking
  • safety-in-numbers as path to bicycling safety
  • policy measures to increase and improve bicycling
  • estimating the demand for bicycling
  • designing bicycle facilities, particularly road and bridge bike lanes
  • motorists' responsibility for bicycle safety
  • helmets and safety (incl. problems with U.S. emphasis on helmet promotion)

See especially these recent reports and articles:

Policy Analysis, General

As his nearly half-century in public policy attests, Komanoff can analyze and scope almost any macro or micro issue in environment, energy and transport policy. If additional expertise is required, he can call on his vast network of contacts in academia, agencies and NGO's.

 

Document and Article Writing

Komanoff is a superb writer, with a flair for conveying complex policy issues clearly and scintillatingly. His op-ed pieces appear in national newspapers such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and The Los Angeles Times, and tabloids such as The (NY) Daily News and NY Newsday. Komanoff's articles have graced such bastions of fine writing as The New York Review of Books, New York Magazine, the Encyclopedia of Energy, and Orion. His reports and books are considered models of accessible scholarship.