We examine the economic efficiency of incentive mechanisms used to promote Renewable Energy (RE) across the European Union (EU) by looking at returns to investors along with any negative externalities or social costs. Using electricity price data from 2009 to 2013, we evaluate the RE support mechanisms adopted by some of the largest EU economies….
Tag: Renewable energy
Offshore grids for renewables: do we need a particular regulatory framework?
Onshore, generators are connected to the transmission grid by TSOs. This regulatory model could simply be extended to offshore (i.e. Germany), but the connection of offshore wind farms to shore is also an opportunity to test alternatives, i.e. the third party model (i.e. the UK) or the generator model (i.e. Sweden). In this paper, we…
Different Cost Perspectives for Renewable Energy Support: Assessment of Technology-neutral and Discriminatory Auctions
Auctions are the prevalent instrument for promoting renewable energy sources worldwide, especially in the European Union and in Latin America. Auctions enable the controlled deployment of renewable energy sources while reducing costs. However, there are different views on relevant costs, auction targets, and their implications on the auction design. Here, the application of technology-neutral auctions…
Irish and British electricity prices: what recent history implies for future prices
This paper compares retail and wholesale electricity prices in SEM, the market of the island of Ireland, and BETTA in Great Britain. Estimated wholesale costs are much lower in BETTA. We show that this is mostly because the wholesale price in BETTA is set too low to cover generation costs, although it is compensated by…
Evaluating Renewable Portfolio Standards for In-State Renewable Deployment: Accounting for Policy Heterogeneity
Renewable portfolio standards (RPS) are the most common state-level policies for promoting renewable electricity in the United States. State RPS policies are heterogeneously designed, particularly with respect to their use of flexibility mechanisms that allow obligations to be met with renewable energy generated in other states. However, the renewable energy that is produced within an…
Germany’s Nuclear Phase-out: Sensitivities and Impacts on Electricity Prices and CO2 Emissions
Following the nuclear meltdown in Fukushima Daiichi, in summer 2011 the German parliament decided to phase-out nuclear power by 2022. When this decision was taken, a number of model-based analyses investigated the influence this decision would have on electricity prices and CO2 emissions. They concluded that CO2 emissions would be kept at levels that are…
Distributional Effects of Energy Transition: Impacts of Renewable Electricity Support in Germany
The discussion of the support for renewable energy must consider the distributional impact of cost allocation. The public is sensitive to social imbalances caused by rising power prices that might jeopardize the acceptance of energy transformation. By the end of 2012 about 19 percent of German power is produced with renewables other than hydropower. As…
German Nuclear Policy Reconsidered: Implications for the Electricity Market
In the aftermath of the nuclear catastrophe in Fukushima-Daiichi, German nuclear policy has been reconsidered. This paper demonstrates the economic effects of an accelerated nuclear phase-out in Germany on the European electricity market. An optimization model is used to analyze two scenarios with different lifetimes for nuclear plants in Germany (phase-out vs. prolongation). Based on…