Due to climate change, man-made conflicts, and rising inflation, a growing number of people around the world are struggling to have consistent access to safe and nutritious food. This phenomenon is known as food insecurity (FI). Therefore, we take in this thesis the first steps towards developing a monitoring process for assessing FI using Human-Centered AI (HCAI). We developed this process for, and in collaboration with, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC). The IPC is an organization that helps countries classify levels of food insecurity in their regions to inform humanitarian decision-making. During our research process, we found that any form of HCAI for the IPC would need to be informed by input from their domain experts, and we concluded that we could not start implementing HCAI until we found a way to formalize their input in a way that was robust and suited their technical capabilities. To this end, we ran an experiment with 18 IPC experts in Malawi to see whether they could quantify their assumptions by setting thresholds for food security drivers. The results are encouraging but show that there is still much to be done to bridge the gap between domain knowledge and technical expertise. We also show in this thesis that there is a lack of real-life case studies on HCAI development and share therefore our lessons learned from our real-world HCAI case study on FI monitoring. In this way, we hope to promote the development of a practice-informed methodology for HCAI.

Climate change is a topic being addressed by many countries worldwide. One of the most recent treaties is the Paris Agreement signed in 2015 by 196 parties, where they agree on a common goal: restrict global warming to be climate-neutral by 2050. Peru by being one of the signing parties that played a relevant role before and during the Paris Agreement discussions, submitted their Nationally Determined Contributions in 2016.

Even when climate policies are implemented, their success is found to be related to society's acceptance of them. Moreover, citizens' support for policies is related to the alignment of such policies with their preferences, and research shows that citizens' preferences are based on their values. Additionally, it is known that there are balanced tensions between values, which are translated into trade-offs. Different participatory methods have been used for preference elicitation. In Peru, however, it has been found that the processes followed have an apparent entry barrier for individuals, therefore, other methods can be explored. A recently developed method is Participatory Value Evaluation, in which the participants are asked to make a selection among a set of alternatives while considering its effects and one or more restrictions. This method has been mainly applied in Europe, with some of them being focused on climate change subjects. Based on this the primary and secondary research questions are defined as:

1. How do Peruvian citizens trade-off climate change mitigation measures among the two most polluting sectors, from a set of policy alternatives?
2. How is Participatory Value Evaluation perceived by Peruvian citizens and how does it differ from Dutch citizens' perception?

Based on the literature review done regarding the method, a Participatory Value Evaluation experiment is designed using the knowledge gathered from the research on the climate policy situation in Peru and its region. This includes a total of six policy measures part of the country's two most polluting sectors (i.e., Energy and Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use). The designed Participatory Value Evaluation is conducted between July 3rd and July 17th, 2023.

It can be concluded that Peruvian citizens prefer policy alternatives that yield positive and direct environmental outcomes, especially when accompanied by minimal monetary expense. Citizens would trade off a higher cost for even a moderate reduction in harmful emissions, provided the health benefits are explicitly articulated. The inclination to make a trade-off between cost and emission reduction diminishes when health and environmental benefits are either not explicitly outlined or fail to reach a significant threshold. Finally, based on the preference patterns of the individuals, four distinct groups were identified. These are mainly dependent on their considerations of the effects each policy alternative may bring. These insights reinforce the importance individuals across different education levels, attribute to the environment, particularly regarding deforestation.

Regarding the method, it can be concluded that Peruvian citizens had a positive and favourable experience when participating in the PVE for climate change mitigation. In a similar manner to the Dutch citizens, Peruvian individuals exhibited a positive perception of the method. In like manner, a majority of individuals believed it is a good method to involve citizens in governmental decisions regarding climate change policies. These insights seem to foster an inclination for continued engagement and provide their opinion on other subjects relevant to Peruvian society. Equally important, citizens would appreciate the real repercussions resulting from their input within the decision-making process.

As part of the EU Green Deal, the European Commission (EC) has announced a new renewable energy policy instrument that is to be installed in addition to the Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) of the EU: the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM). CBAM obligates companies, from non-EU countries who want to import products from the selected CBAM sectors – Iron & Steel, Aluminium, Cement, Fertilizers and Electricity – into the EU, to pay a certain tariff for the carbon content of that product. Initially, CBAM covers only imports and the carbon emitted during the actual production of the products. CBAM has four objectives: (i) preventing carbon leakage; (ii) protecting EU industries against reduced competitiveness; (iii) incentivising non-EU trade partners to adopt measures comparable to the EU’s; and (iv) yielding revenue to reuse in accelerating decarbonisation of the energy system. Using interviews and a literature study, a case study was conducted on the dynamics of the trade flows of aluminium between Germany and China. Given these dynamics, six themes were studied to assess the consequences of CBAM: (i) compatibility of the policy instrument; (ii) administrative work needed; (iii) stimulation of decarbonisation in non-EU countries; (iv) competitive position of the German aluminium sector; (v) economic and geopolitical winners and losers; (vi) the three major risks of CBAM. This led to four factors that help in assessing the influence of CBAM and making CBAM more effective in achieving its objectives. These factors are tailor-made, manageability, export dependency and geographical closeness. Assessing the impact of CBAM on a specific sector from an economic and geopolitical perspective proved to be a highly complex process, where each factor is surrounded by a lot of uncertainty. The four factors can be used in further research on CBAM, as well as its future implementation.

The jobs of the world population are increasingly threatened in a world filled with constant technological improvements, and automation of tasks by machinery and artificial intelligence. Substitution of labour by machines is not only occurring in blue-collar jobs (usually uniformed workers working in eg. manufacturing) but increasingly also in white-collar jobs (usually ‘suit-and-tie’ workers working in offices). The more labour-saving technology is created and deployed, the more jobs are made obsolete, possibly leading to technological unemployment. This problem is likely to be aggravated by research and policies that are concerned with the so-called 'productivity paradox' or 'Solow-paradox', as well as the 'cost disease', and that seek to avoid or remedy both by increasing labour productivity across-the-board, that is, in 'personal services' such as education, health care, research, and the arts as well as in the goods-producing economy. If this were feasible, how could technological unemployment be avoided? Another option, explored in this thesis, is to take a fresh look at these phenomena, by asking whether they really are a 'disease' or 'paradox', or simply a consequence of a (harmless) natural structural change that is taking place in society, namely, the growth of 'personal services' relative to the physical (goods-producing) economy. Inspired by the writings of William Baumol (1993, 2012), this thesis explains that it will be possible to avoid dramatic increases in unemployment, if the productivity gains that are achieved in the technologically progressive sector (that implements labour-saving technologies) are used to fund the creation of new work in the technologically stagnant sector, the sector that tends to have a lower labour productivity growth compared to the technologically progressive sector. According to Baumol (1993, 2012), it is not possible or not desirable to increase labour productivity in the stagnant sector in the same way as this happens in the progressive sector by for example replacing human beings with software, machines, and AI. It may not be possible because of the nature of work in the stagnant sector compared to the progressive sector and it may not be desirable because the quality of services may decrease (Baumol & Wolff 1998). A case study involving the Netherlands and Germany, both of which are shown to suffer from the 'cost disease', was carried out to investigate whether the transfers of funds from the progressive to the stagnant sector is a realistic possibility. If resources are to be transferred from the progressive to the stagnant sector, the question arises how this could be realised. One possibility is investigated, namely, that governments implement profit taxation in the technologically progressive sector to collect the productivity gains in this sector and then use it to fund new work 7 in the technologically stagnant sector, including a public educational system. The conditions under which this solution is feasible was then investigated for the Netherlands and Germany, and concludes that Baumol’s (1993, 2012) solution to the cost disease could be realised if 50-70% of productivity gains in the progressive sector are used to fund work in the stagnant sector, and as long as the average wage rate in the stagnant sector is not consistently higher than the average wage rate in the progressive sector.

Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) are widely used tools for estimating climate change's impacts on the socio-economic system. However, IAMs possess a limited ability to represent the impact on vulnerable populations. Influential IAMs use highly aggregated outcomes masking significant relative differences in impacts across heterogeneous populations and time. Therefore IAM studies systematically undervalue the need for faster CO2 emission reductions to prevent substantial climate impacts on low-income groups. Previous literature has proposed alternative distributive principles to use in IAMs to overcome inequity problems in current abatement pathways. Due to the heterogeneous models, scenario assumptions, and principles used, comparison between studies has been difficult. Therefore the literature lacks an overarching comparative study of the performance of various distributive principles. Furthermore, deep uncertainty present within climate change is often not considered because most studies focus on single-scenario optimality. Therefore, current abatement pathways contribute to maintaining current economic inequalities and possess exposure to uncertainty. This thesis applies alternative principles to the RICE model through a MORDM method. Alternative distributive principles are used to generate more equitable abatement strategies using a MOEA. This research analyses four main principles: the Prioritarian, Sufficitarian, Egalitarian, and the Utilitarian principle. Alternative principles generate significantly different abatement trajectories than the Nordhaus optimal policy. Sufficitarian policies have the most stringent abatement targets focusing on reaching net-zero emissions by 2065. Prioritarian strategies aim at 2065-2105. Utilitarian strategies focus on reaching net-zero emissions around 2135. Lastly, Egalitarian policies enforce slow climate abatement. Abatement strategies have been stress-tested through an uncertainty analysis based on the SPP-framework and exposure to long-term climate uncertainty. Sufficitarian strategies possess high robustness to climate extremes and high average performance across all scenarios. Prioritarian strategies possess high average robustness but lower regret-based robustness. This research shows that alternative principles can successfully generate well-performing abatement pathways in the RICE model that outperform Utilitarian-based policies. The Sufficitarian principle's capacity to produce equitable and economically optimal strategies has been undervalued in previous research. Lastly, this thesis emphasizes that stronger climate action is needed to prevent possible disastrous worldwide impacts on low-income groups. Global emission reductions should adhere to a global warming of 1.5 degrees set out by the IPCC, which is consistent with the best-performing pathways found in this research. A first step would be to reduce existing economic inequalities to overcome exposure to climate extremes for lower-income groups.

In the Netherlands, the developing of offshore wind power (OWP) systems is one of options for electricity generation from renewable energy sources (RES-E) for the transition to a sustainable energy system. In 2015, the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) announced that around 6500 MW of total offshore wind capacity required in the Netherlands could be realized by 2030. The relatively low commercial maturity of OWP technology and also some distinct technological features (e.g. long lead-time, high capital cost) of OWP lead to certain market barriers which consequently result in market failure. The Dutch government has applied economic policy instruments, as public resources, in order to overcome all the market barriers. Despite the fact that several support systems are being implemented by the Dutch government, they could not meet the predefined objectives. Up until 2017, only 957 MW was implemented and supplied to the grid. Primary literature study confirms that the lack of investment by investors is one of the most important reasons for this failure. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the efficiency and effectiveness of economic policy instruments when it comes to stimulating investment in new OWP projects in the Netherlands by adopting a sustainable and distributive justice approach. This study is composed of four main parts: the literature review, the case study, the analysis, and the design. The review illustrates that FiT and TGC have been the most commonly implemented policies among EU member states over the last 25 years. Also by literature review four criteria are identified for the evaluation of those four suggested policy instruments. Effectiveness, efficiency (static and dynamic as well), and certainty for investors are the most common criteria for evaluation of policy instruments. Equity in terms of distributive justice is the fourth criterion to be considered in more recent evaluations. The case study confirms that Feed-in Tariff (FiT) and Tradable Green Certificates (TGCs) are the two main policy instruments implemented in the Netherlands. The lack of political stability is seen as one of main reason why they failed to meet their objectives. A multi-criteria analysis (MCA) was applied as the decision-making method for selecting applicable support system in sustainable way. Sustainable development implies that social, economic and environmental aspects must be equally considered whilst not compromising one particular aspect. This method is well-known as a method in which all criteria have equal weight. This analysis addresses the fact that while there is not one concrete policy instrument to meet objectives effectively and efficiently at the same time, one improved and adjusted (dual) FiT system is a proper policy instrument that could stimulate investment in OWP projects in the Netherlands in the new future. The last part of this thesis includes the design of the new recommended support system (dual FiT) to enable responsible innovation in OWP development.