Dr Pete Barbrook-Johnson

Profile

Teaching Associate, Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford
Lecturer in Social Economics, Department of Arts and Sciences, UCL
Associate Fellow, INET, University of Oxford

Pete is a social scientist, economist, complexity scientist, and systems thinker. He regularly uses research methods such as agent-based modelling and systems mapping in his applied environmental, energy, and public health research and policy analysis. He teaches on a range of undergraduate and masters courses, focussing on the economics, the knowledge economy, economics of environmental change, and the use of complexity and systems sciences in environmental issues.

Pete is currently a Lecturer in Social Economics at UCL, a Teaching Associate at the Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford, and an Associate Fellow at INET. At ECI, he co-supervises several DPhil students, teaches his masters elective on complexity and systems approaches to environment, and guest lecturers on ECM/ECP.

He was previously a Departmental Research Lecturer and Senior Research Associate at ECI and INET, and Deputy Director of the NERC Agile Initiative. He was also the Technical Modelling Lead for the UK government EEIST project on new economic modelling of energy innovation and transition.

View a full list of Pete's academic publications on his Google Scholar page.

Publications

Sun, Z. et al. (2026) “Multi-level agent-based modelling of social-ecological systems: Bridging the gap between the micro and macro levels”, Socio-Environmental Systems Modelling, 8, pp. 18914–18914.

Youngman, T. et al. (2025) Complexity economics insights for the Seventh Carbon Budget. Agile Initiative, Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford, pp. 1–6.

Lynch, C. et al. (2025) “Tackling transformational change in climate policy appraisal: experiences and perceptions of United Kingdom policy analysts”, Energy Research and Social Science, 127.

Lenton, T. et al. (2025) “A method to identify positive tipping points to accelerate low-carbon transitions and actions to trigger them”, Sustainability Science, 21(1), pp. 201–220.

Hepburn, C. et al. (2025) “Economic models and frameworks to guide climate policy”, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, p. graf020.

Fu, Y. et al. (2025) “Evaluating social perceptions and diffusion networks of green travel: a case of China with Weibo”, Transport Policy, 169, pp. 9–25.

Barbrook-Johnson, P. et al. (2024) “Cross-scale feedbacks and tipping points in aggregated models of socio-ecological systems”, Socio-Environmental Systems Modeling, 6, pp. 18616–18616.

Pasqualino, R. et al. (2024) “Modelling induced innovation for the low-carbon energy transition: a menu of options”, Environmental Research Letters, 19(7).

Barbrook-Johnson, P. et al. (2024) “Economic modelling fit for the demands of energy decision makers”, Nature Energy, 9(3), pp. 229–231.

Mealy, P. et al. (2023) “Sensitive intervention points: a strategic approach to climate action”, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 39(4), pp. 694–710.