Staff Testimonial
Mert Yakut
Research Officer in Climate Research Area
I joined the ESRI as a post-doctoral research fellow in the energy and environment research area in October 2017 and became a Research Officer in November 2019. I obtained my PhD degree in economics from the Department of Economics at the Middle East Technical University (METU), Ankara, Turkey. Prior to joining the ESRI, I worked as a research and teaching assistant and post-doctoral researcher at the same department at METU. My academic interests are computable general equilibrium modelling, climate change, labour market, social policies, income distribution, migration, quantitative analysis, and microeconometrics.
"The climate research programme of the ESRI plays a pivotal role in providing timely and comprehensive scientific evidence in assessing the economic implications of the transition to a low-carbon economy."
The programme's research outputs are based on Ireland's first fully dynamic/intertemporal computable general equilibrium (CGE) model, namely the Ireland Energy, Economy and Environment (I3E) model. My primary responsibility has been constructing, maintaining and developing the model to better understand the energy- economy-environment interrelationships from a broader perspective by filling a gap in modelling in Ireland. The level of detail in the I3E model allows us to analyse the implications of policy changes in various areas, ranging from carbon taxation to removing fossil fuel subsidies, from retrofitting residential units to aviation taxation.
''As a result, my career at the ESRI allows me to interact with many stakeholders, including several government departments and research institutions, to contribute to shaping Irish climate change policies.''
It was a pleasure to see that the climate research programme's very first outputs played an important role in the decision of the Irish government to increase the carbon tax in 2019 for the first time since 2014.
I sincerely believe that working at the ESRI is a privilege for several reasons. First, you can enjoy a range of social events organised by our Sport & Social Committee through which you can learn about many cultures since the Institute employs researchers from 27 different countries. Second, the institute provides a flexible working environment that is crucial in scientific research institutions for the productivity of researchers.. Third, the institute provides many training opportunities, e.g., media skills and effective communications, to allow employees to gain new skills for their career development.