Energy Finance Lab
Integrating Financial Insight into Decision-Making and Advancing Ideas to Foster More Capital Investment into the Energy Transition
Integrating Financial Insight into Decision-Making and Advancing Ideas to Foster More Capital Investment into the Energy Transition
Energy Finance Lab
Reference Corner
Restoring energy resilience and security while decarbonizing the global economy are generational challenges that will cost Trillions of dollars. Public capital can realistically provide only a very small portion. Instead, the public sector needs to create vibrant enabling environments for private investment; there is also ample room for the private sector to act on its own.
The Energy Finance Lab’s mission is to support the initiatives of the Payne Institute, with a guiding principle to foster market-based solutions to unlock private investment. Among other recent research, the EFL is exploring government interventions for critical mineral development, systems to track and financialize carbon footprint and fugitive methane emissions, and the use of carbon markets to fund climate mitigation activities such as plugging oil & gas wells and carbon capture & storage. The Lab also provides explainers across commodity, carbon and energy markets for the benefit of policy makers and other stakeholders.
The Energy Finance Lab Collaborates with these Payne Inititatives
Accelerated Methane Reduction
Low Carbon Energy Technologies
Critical Minerals
Native American Mining and Energy Sovereignty
Supply Chain Transparency
RESEARCH
ASM Opportunities in Southern Zambia: Potential of Supply Chain Decoupling to Drive New Regional Markets 11/12/2026
ASM Opportunities in Southern Zambia: Potential of Supply Chain Decoupling to Drive New Regional Markets
Payne Institute Student Researcher Andrew Bauman, Faculty Fellow Ian Lange, and Energy Finance Lab Director Brad Handler write about how as western powers, such the US and EU, pursue non-adversarial sources of critical minerals, Zambia’s Southern province offers an example of how artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) can be harnessed. November 12, 2026.
China expands overseas mining stakes, tightening grip on critical minerals 11/4/2026
China expands overseas mining stakes, tightening grip on critical minerals
Payne Institute Energy Finance Lab Director Brad Handler contributed to this article about how the state-led push could give Beijing greater leverage over global supplies of critical minerals and who gets access to them. November 4, 2026.
Methane Certification & Carbon Credits: The gaps in data, standardization & policy 11/2/2026
Methane Certification & Carbon Credits: The gaps in data, standardization & policy
Payne Institute Energy Finance Lab Director Brad Handler discussing the complexities of carbon markets, the challenges of standardization and measurement, and the implications of methane emissions from orphan wells on the Navigating Carbon podcast. November 2, 2026.
Select U.S. State Oil & Gas Well Plugging Legislative Update and Consideration of the Use of Carbon Markets 10/29/2026
Select U.S. State Oil & Gas Well Plugging Legislative Update and Consideration of the Use of Carbon Markets
Energy Finance Lab Program Director Brad Handler recently addressed a group of sustainability investors on the topic of recent U.S. State efforts to accelerate oil and gas well plugging and to avoid more wells falling into orphan status. October 29, 2026.
The Investment Gap in Copper Mining 10/26/2026
The Investment Gap in Copper Mining
Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian, Adam Simon, Macdonald Amoah, Faculty Fellow Andrew Pederson, and Max Brown write about how our recent paper on the supply demand gap in copper found that business-as-usual demand for mined copper reaches 37.1 million tonnes a year by 2050 and that mines operating in 2018 will supply only 17.8 million tonnes of that total. This paper uses a simple methodology that converts that physical shortfall into a capital (investment) requirement. October 26, 2026.
US government equity stakes deliver short-lived boost to metals, mining shares 10/20/2026
US government equity stakes deliver short-lived boost to metals, mining shares
Payne Institute Energy Finance Lab Director Brad Handler contributed to this article about how shares of publicly traded metals and mining companies that received US government equity investments have tanked since the deals were announced, as investors ignore the government’s vote of confidence in favor of market fundamentals. October 20, 2026.
Making Government Equity Ownership Official 8/7/2026
Making Government Equity Ownership Official
Payne Institute Energy Finance Lab Director Brad Handler and Student Researcher Matthew Safran write about how in June, the House and Senate Armed Services Committees advanced the FY2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), Congress’s annual defense policy bill. The legislation covers hundreds of defense programs and policies but one small provision, Section 1051, tackles a different challenge: managing the risks of an untested facet of the current administration’s more muscular industrial policy. August 7, 2026.
The AI Boom Is Becoming a Credit Bet 7/31/2026
The AI Boom Is Becoming a Credit Bet
Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian writes about how AI financing has progressed from concentrated venture equity into a cross-asset financing system, while the market signals required to validate the buildout—utilization, cash generation, debt absorption and physical energization—remain unresolved. July 31, 2026.
Payne Institute for Public Policy | Annual Report 2025-2026 7/9/2026
Payne Institute for Public Policy – Annual Report 2025-2026
The Payne Institute for Public Policy’s 2025-2026 Annual Report highlights a year of growing impact at the intersection of energy, critical minerals, and global security. July 9, 2026.
Give gas a passport, not a pardon: A digital fix to Europe’s methane problem 7/1/2026
Give gas a passport, not a pardon: A digital fix to Europe’s methane problem
Aaron Lohman and Payne Institute Energy Finance Lab Director Brad Handler writes about how technology could help fix the EU’s methane emissions reporting rules. A fight is underway over Europe’s methane rules between the US and European Union. July 1, 2026.
