We compare the effectiveness of social comparison nudges on energy consumption when residents pay for electricity and when electricity is included in monthly rent. Using a randomized control trial, our intervention uses digital messages (text and emails) to provide residents with home energy reports comparing their recent electricity usage with similar households. Our design allows…
Levelized Cost of Consumed Electricity
Current calculations to evaluate the profitability of the various energy generating units ignore intermittency as well as complementary technologies, such as battery storage and smart meters. Therefore, we propose a new assessment of the cost of solar energy that takes into account smart grids. In doing this, we use data from a low energy dwelling…
The Future of Russian Gas Exports
Disputes between Russia and Ukraine over the terms for gas transit and deliveries prompted Russia to accelerate development of new gas pipelines to Europe circumventing Ukraine, as well as exploring the potential for gas export to additional markets like Turkey and China. The current paper examines implications of Russia increasing its gas exports capacity by…
Sustainable and Socially Resilient Minigrid Franchise Model for an Urban Informal Settlement in Kenya
Kibera is a large informal settlement, in Nairobi, Kenya where electricity access is presently expensive, intermittent, and dirty. The context of Kibera also speaks to larger global dynamics of rapid urbanization, the creation of an urban poor, the transitory experience of informal settlements, and the role of non-governmental actors; each of which provides challenges to…
Book Reviews
Prosumage and the future regulation of utilities: An introduction
The objective of this EEEP symposium is to assess recent developments in prosumage- including technical and economic trends, the impacts of different regulatory settings, and their relationships to utility strategy and regulation in the light of recent trends-and to sketch out potential future pathways. The symposium brings together in-depth analyses of the prosumage phenomenon and…
Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards for Appliances: Old and New Economic Rationales
We revisit Hausman and Joskow (1982)’s economic rationales for appliance minimum energy efficiency standards. In addition to the four market failures they argued could justify appliance standards – energy prices below marginal social cost, consumers underestimating energy prices, consumer discount rates above social discount rates, and principal-agent problems – we discuss two additional market failures…
Book Reviews
How Incumbent Cultural and Cognitive Path Dependencies Constrain the ‘Scenario Cone’: Reliance on Carbon Dioxide Removal due to Techno-bias
Scenario analysis is widely used to assess long-term development necessary to reach climate targets. Mitigation measures in these scenarios concentrate on supply-side technology solutions, while little attention has been paid to demand side solutions. One suite of included technologies are carbon dioxide removal technologies (CDR). Most scenarios rely heavily on CDR to limit global warming…
Lessons from Modeling 100% Renewable Scenarios Using GENeSYS-MOD
The main aim of models has never been to provide numbers, but insights. Still, challenges prevail for modelers to use the best configuration of their models to provide helpful insights. In the case of energy system modelling, this becomes even more complicated due to increasing complexity of the energy system transition through the potential and…