the renewables portfolio standard in texas an early assessment texas has rapidly emerged as one of the leading wind power markets in the united states this development can be largely traced to a well designed and carefully implemented renewables portfolio standard rps the rps is a new policy mechanism that has received increasing attention as an attractive approach to support renewable power generation though replacing existing renewable energy policies with an as of yet untested approach in the rps is risky early experience from texas suggests that an rps can effectively spur renewables development and encourage competition among renewable energy producers initial rps targets in texas were well exceeded by the end of 2001 with 915 mw of wind installed in that year alone rps compliance costs appear negligible with new wind projects reportedly contracted for well under 3 us cent k wh in part as a result of a 1 7 us cent kwh production tax credit an outstanding wind resource and an rps that is sizable enough to drive project economies of scale obliged retail suppliers have been willing to enter into long term contracts with renewable generators reducing important risks for both the developer and the retail supplier finally the country s first comprehensive renewable energy certificate program has been put into place to monitor and track rps compliance c 2002 published by elsevier science ltd less

coping with change a study of local irrigation institutions in taiwan abstract this paper examines how taiwan s local irrigation institutions have evolved and changed amid rapid political economic development in the last decade based upon the literatures of institutional analysis and common pool resource management i discuss and compare how local irrigation institutions in three areas in the country have responded or failed to respond to the changing environment a major finding is that local self governing irrigation institutions are not doomed to fail amid economic development several variables affect the incentives and capacity of farmers to redesign their local institutions to cope with the changes in the macro setting particularly flexible status quo institutions and a conductive governance regime can better facilitate farmers rule crafting efforts

dynamic multidimensional assessment of sustainability at the macro level the case of austria abstract this paper explores the issue of sustainability at the macro scale employing multi criteria decision aid mcda methods the incommensurability of values and the essentially multi dimensional and dynamic nature of sustainability challenge the use of composite measurement indices this determined the choice of mcda methods austria was chosen as a case study due to the wide availability of data especially on indicators of strong sustainability the structure of the multi criteria problem comprised the evolution of different sustainability dimensions over time the process for selecting criteria included a critical assessment of institutional sustainability agendas un eu and austrian government and theoretical recommendations after an assessment of mcda methods the naiade method demonstrated the most suitable properties for sustainability assessment the application of this outranking approach was undertaken in three separate settings long term from 1960 to 2003 medium term 1970 1995 and short term 1995 2003 with varying numbers of criteria the response of results to the addition of evaluating criteria and periods was tested the degree of credibility for accepting preference relations was also employed for sensitivity analysis according to the results of long term and medium term assessments especially in the weak sustainability setting sustainable progress is taking place in austria in the short term in the stronger sustainability setting and especially as the number of criteria increases more incomparable periods appear and trends are less determined moreover it is shown how results crucially depend on the methodological choices this is one of the first applications of the multi criteria tools to the dynamic analysis of sustainability at the macro scale

multicriteria analysis vs externalities assessment for the comparative evaluation of electricity generation systems attributing costs to the environmental impacts of energy production and use could greatly assist in environmental planning because monetary values are capable of directly influencing energy decisions without changing the rules of the market despite the considerable progress made recently in the valuation of environmental externalities there is still an open debate about the reliability of the estimated damage costs this paper is aimed at comparing the external costs calculated for a number of power plants using different energy sources with the outcome of a multicriteria analysis where environmental impacts are expressed in physical terms or on a qualitative scale similarities and disparities in the obtained rankings are identified and clarified on the basis of the fundamental principles of the two approaches it is concluded that although external costs do not accurately reflect the traditional value system of individual decision makers they give suitable price signals and thus help in eliminating distortions of the current energy market

price indexes inequality and the measurement of world poverty i discuss the measurement of world poverty and inequality with particular attention to the role of purchasing power parity ppp price indexes from the international comparison project global inequality increased with the latest revision of the icp and this reduced the global poverty line relative to the us dollar the recent large increase of nearly half a billion poor people came from an inappropriate updating of the global poverty line not from the icp revisions even so ppp comparisons between widely different countries rest on weak theoretical and empirical foundations i argue for wider use of self reports from international monitoring surveys and for a global poverty line that is truly denominated in us dollars

market based biogas sector development in least developed countries the case of cambodia in many of the least developed countries the energy security conundrum is how to provide affordable safe and clean energy to a low income rural population household level generation of biogas from animal waste for both cooking and lighting while producing high quality organic fertiliser is increasingly proposed as a viable part of the solution for farming households since the early 1990s international development organisations often in cooperation with the national government have attempted to introduce biogas technologies in many least developed countries but most initiatives failed in this landscape of failed biogas development programmes the national biodigester programme nbp cambodia started in 2006 with the aim to establish a permanent market oriented and self financed biogas sector the results show the development of a sustainable domestic biodigester sector a rapid diffusion of biodigesters among poor rural households but still ambivalences on financial independency from external funding and carbon finance the conclusion is that a pure market model for biogas development in the rural area of the least developed countries will not easily work governmental regulation and coordination will remain needed and carbon finance will not easily fully replace oda and governmental financial support

financial incentives to mobilise local citizens as investors in low carbon technologies a systematic literature review abstract mobilising greater levels of private finance through local citizen investment in low carbon technologies can help bridge the capital shortfall to meeting climate objectives while also building societal support for the low carbon transition within this context we undertake a systematic review of literature assessing the impact of technology specific economic and financial incentives promoting greater levels of investment in low carbon technologies from local citizen investors both individuals and community groups we focus in particular on the impact of feed in tariffs compared to quota schemes grants tax incentives and soft loans the analysis suggests that local citizen investors do not necessarily act in an economically rational manner in response to these incentives it underscores the importance of understanding the preferences of target demographics the local context as well as the characteristics of the technologies in question and suggests interventions should be considered as part of wider policy packages while identifying challenges to be overcome through instrument design we find that feed in tariffs grants and tax incentives can be successful in mobilising greater levels of investment from local citizen investors but that soft loans tend to be less effective as a stand alone instrument the review identifies areas meriting further exploration in this emerging field of research

social cost of co2 abatement from energy efficiency and solar power in the united states frequently cited empirical analyses ask whether we should make the transition from reliance on fossil fuels to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and conclude that the transition is too costly so we should instead focus policy on how to adapt to global warming this paper makes two improvements in the analysis first this empirical analysis accounts for existing low cost alternatives that are substitutes for fossil fuels second this empirical analysis incorporates existing estimates of externalities from fossil fuels these two basic improvements in the analysis alter the conclusion policy should focus on how rapidly and extensively to make the transition from reliance on fossil fuels to the alternatives the corollary is that we should focus on the efficacy and cost of policy options that are designed to accomplish the transition

institutional design of public agencies and coproduction a study of irrigation associations in taiwan abstract the provision and production of many public goods and services involve the joint effort of government officials and citizen users this paper examines the successful experience of irrigation governance and management in taiwan as a means of understanding how joint efforts can be established and sustained through institutional arrangements several principles for institutional design including a careful definition of the scope of farmers participation complementarity of interests between individuals reduction of asymmetries involved in the use of authority and the existence of domains of autonomy are identified as instrumental to the success in taiwan

back to the future rethinking auctions for renewable electricity support abstract the effectiveness and cost effectiveness of two main types of instruments feed in tariffs and quotas with tradable green certificates have usually been compared in the literature on renewable electricity promotion due to negative past experiences with a third instrument auctions this instrument has been broadly dismissed in academics and until recently also in policy practice however and based on an in depth review of experiences with auction schemes for renewable electricity around the world this paper argues that some of the problems with auctions in the past can be mitigated with the appropriate design elements and that indeed auctions can play an important role in the future implementation of renewable electricity support instruments around the world the paper provides a proposal for the coherent integration of several design elements

which factors influence the expansion of bioenergy an empirical study of the investment behaviours of german farmers the german government is planning to increase the share of renewable energy sources in this context it is important to understand the decision making behaviour of farmers regarding investments in renewable energy systems that generate energy from biomass and farmers reactions to investment support measures to study this behaviour we conduct a survey and confront farmers with a hypothetical opportunity to invest in a biogas plant our findings reveal that farmers have heterogeneous investment thresholds their investment decisions are mainly driven by capital costs and the subjective perception of the risk resulting from the investment other decision parameters like sustainability and non monetary objectives that are also examined in this paper play only minor roles however bounded rationality is an important factor moreover the influence of an investment subsidy was analysed only about half of the amount of the subsidy as expected according to normative forecast models is reflected in an increased willingness to invest furthermore farmers who have previously invested in bioenergy plants show lower investment thresholds and have stronger reactions to the subsidy regarding the expansion of renewable energies these findings are meaningful for policy impact analysis

supplementing an emissions tax by a feed in tariff for renewable electricity to address learning spillovers abstract in the presence of learning spillovers related to renewable energy technologies an optimal strategy to mitigate climate change should complement an emissions tax by a subsidy for renewables this article addresses the question how such subsidy should be designed it is shown that the widely used approach of a revenue neutral fixed feed in tariff can yield an optimal outcome under restrictive conditions only it has to be adapted continuously as the electricity price changes moreover funding the tariff by a surcharge on the electricity price has important implications for the design of the emission tax the optimal tax rate has to be below the pigovian level differentiated across fossil fuels and adapted over time as the patterns of technological development change these requirements may pose a formidable challenge for practical decision making however it is important to point out that the eventual choices made with respect to the design and funding of a feed in tariff have to be based on a careful and more comprehensive policy assessment including inter alia economic effects beyond the electricity sector and existing institutional constraints

explaining the attacker s advantage technological paradigms organizational dynamics and the value network abstract understanding when entrants might have an advantage over an industry s incumbent firms in developing and adopting new technologies is a question which several scholars have explained in terms of technological capabilities or organizational dynamics this paper proposes that the value network the context within which a firm competes and solves customers problems is an important factor affecting whether incumbent or entrant firms will most successfully innovate in a study of technology development in the disk drive industry the authors found that incumbents led the industry in developing and adopting new technologies of every sort identified by earlier scholars at component and architectural levels competency enhancing and competency destroying incremental and radical as long as the technology addressed customers needs within the value network in which the incumbents competed entrants led in developing and adopting technologies which addressed user needs in different emerging value networks it is in these innovations which disrupted established trajectories of technological progress in established markets that attackers proved to have an advantage the rate of improvement in product performance which technologists provide may exceed the rate of improvement demanded in established markets this mismatch between trajectories enables firms entering emerging value networks subsequently to attack the industry s established markets as well

evolutionary theories in environmental and resource economics approaches and applications recent advances in evolutionary theory have important implications for environmental economics a short overview is offered of evolutionarythinking in economics subsequently major concepts and approaches inevolutionary biology and evolutionary economics are presented andcompared attention is devoted among others to darwinian selection punctuated equilibrium sorting mechanisms lamarckian evolution coevolution and self organization basic features of evolution such assustained change irreversible change unpredictability qualitativechange and disequilibrium are examined it is argued that there are anumber of fundamental differences as well as similarities betweenbiological and economic evolution next some general implications ofevolutionary thinking for environmental economics are outlined this isfollowed by a more detailed examination of potential uses ofevolutionary theories in specific areas of environmental economics including sustainability and long run development theories technologyand environment ecosystem management and resilience spatial evolutionand environmental processes and design of environmental policy

women s participation in local organizations conditions and constraints abstract civic organizations have a capacity to contribute to economic growth and an equitable distribution of welfare by reducing information asymmetries and transaction costs while donors increasingly recognize that group based projects are a means to advocate organizational capacities of target groups it is not clear whether group based organizations always increase efficiency and equity this article analyses the determinants of participation in local development groups ldgs using data from two projects funded by undp in kashmir and gtz in chad a major result of the empirical analysis is the identification of a middle class effect of participation the exclusion of the majority of the poor can be explained by high opportunity costs to join the group especially for income earning women in addition it can be shown that an existing social network is a pre condition for participation finally the assumption has been confirmed that bargaining power of the members is important for their decision to participate in groups

economic performance of contracts in electricity markets a fuzzy and multiple criteria approach in competitive electricity markets consumers and suppliers are exposed to price risk quantity risk as well as other risks such as credit risk these risks can be managed through an adequate portfolio of contracts the goal of the approach proposed is to help a market player to appraise portfolios of contracts from the point of view of the economic performance that measures the potentiality of gains and the potentiality of losses taking into account the multidimensional aspect of risk the vagueness and nuances of the decision maker s preferences and the different kinds of uncertainties the three steps proposed are portfolio construction portfolio evaluation and portfolio ranking this requires modeling of uncertainties contracts and decision maker s preferences the example of a large consumer of electric energy and a comparison with the value at risk system are presented the proposed approach is applied to appraise different strategies for a swiss utility

renewable micro generation of heat and electricity review on common and missing socio technical configurations abstract a widespread adoption of distributed generation dg technologies in energy systems can play a key role in creating clean reliable energy and support the targets of emission reduction a transition from current modes of production to a significant deployment of renewable energy technologies can fundamentally affect the structure of the industry and change the way energy is produced transmitted and sold the current paper provides an extended review of the socio technical configurations of micro generation based on journal publications and reports during the 21st century the paper analyses currently existing and missing configurations and discusses technology and policy implications to support proliferation of micro generation technology and local energy production from renewable sources the potential for new configurations can be found particularly in heat producing micro generation with solar heat heat pumps and biomass developing further the operations and maintenance of distributed generation technologies and business models appears an area that calls for further innovation and corresponding innovation policy measures third party service and community driven deployment models can aide the proliferation of distributed generation and further innovation therein justifying the introduction of feed in tariffs to attract such models during their early diffusion

structural adjustment in africa insights from the experiences of ghana and senegal abstract structural adjustment in ghana and senegal has helped create an improved framework for economic growth but this is a fragile trend one that could be disrupted by bad weather adverse terms of trade and the vagaries of international assistance the current version of adjustment however has produced little enduring poverty alleviation a weak performance on equity issues together with rising political expectations has generated threats to the sustainability of structural adjustment and overall political stability alternatively adjustment policies can be modified to fully incorporate equity and sustainability objectives in this respect it is critical for the poor to obtain more effective representation in decision making on adjustment through indigenous nongovernment organizations

the management of irrigation systems how to evoke trust and avoid prisoner s dilemma abstract the performance of canal irrigation systems depends partly on trust by farmers in the good faith and abilities of irrigation officials in india this trust is typically lacking there is instead a prisoners dilemma type syndrome of anarchy under the canals in which farmers lack the confidence that if they refrain from taking water out of turn they will get water on time and officials lack the confidence that if they work conscientiously to deliver the water on time farmers will refrain from rule breaking in east asia this syndrome of irrigation anarchy scarcely exists the reasons for the difference are partly to do with agro climatic conditions but they are also related to policy relevant variables of physical design and organizational arrangements within the constraints of agro climatic conditions features of east asian design and organization might usefully be transferred to indian conditions including break point reservoirs irrigation scheduling and monitoring separation of construction organization from operations and maintenance organization and catchment based operating agencies with their own revenue base

geographies of energy transition space place and the low carbon economy this paper makes a case for examining energy transition as a geographical process involving the reconfiguration of current patterns and scales of economic and social activity the paper draws on a seminar series on the geographies of energy transition security climate governance hosted by the authors between 2009 and 2011 which initiated a dialogue between energy studies and the discipline of human geography focussing on the uk government s policy for a low carbon transition the paper provides a conceptual language with which to describe and assess the geographical implications of a transition towards low carbon energy six concepts are introduced and explained location landscape territoriality spatial differentiation scaling and spatial embeddedness examples illustrate how the geographies of a future low carbon economy are not yet determined and that a range of divergent and contending potential geographical futures are in play more attention to the spaces and places that transition to a low carbon economy will produce can help better understand what living in a low carbon economy will be like it also provides a way to help evaluate the choices and pathways available

grassroots based rural development strategies ecuador in comparative perspective abstract international donors are providing increasing amounts of assistance to grassroots based economic initiatives in latin america and elsewhere the question is can such initiatives prosper and generate widespread improvements in living standards in the context of the prevailing neoliberal economic policy agenda the paper responds to this question from comparative latin american and east asian perspectives by analyzing how economic diversification and improved living standards were achieved in two rural parishes in highland ecuador we find that in both cases access to landownership and other assets was a critical factor in permitting small scale producers to participate in market exchange in a manner that allowed them to improve their living standards hence to the extent that neoliberal policies freeze into place the highly inequitable overall structure of asset and income distribution in ecuador and elsewhere such policies inhibit the widespread replication of the two successful cases

the new economic case for migration restrictions an assessment abstract migration barriers tend to reduce global production by impeding efficient spatial reallocation of labor recent research argues for a countervailing effect of barriers tending to raise global production by preventing the spread of impoverishing institutions from poor to rich countries while evidence of this mechanism is scarce it is theoretically plausible at high migration rates we propose and calibrate a simple model of dynamically efficient migration when migrants spread economic institutions between countries the net effect of migration depends on three parameters transmission the degree to which origin country total factor productivity is embodied in migrants assimilation the degree to which migrants productivity determinants become like natives over time in the host country and congestion the degree to which transmission and assimilation change at higher migrant stocks on current evidence about the magnitudes of these parameters dynamically efficient policy would not imply open borders but would imply relaxation of current restrictions

business models of heat entrepreneurship in finland abstract this paper presents the business models of small scale heat energy production in finland firstly the development of heat entrepreneurship in the country is presented including the remarkable growth of small and medium size enterprises smes in the last 15 years secondly the concept of business model business architecture of product service flows and earning logics is modified to the framework of wood heat production the business model concept and its sub concepts is applied in a brief review of current heat energy businesses in finland we arrive at a business model of heat entrepreneurships that are public companies utilities public private partnerships private companies and cooperatives energy saving company esco network model of large enterprise and franchising descriptive cases of these models are presented finally the paper concludes with a discussion on the applicability of the business models in different operational environments and geographical contexts

capitals and capabilities a framework for analyzing peasant viability rural livelihoods and poverty abstract on the basis of themes emerging in current debates on rural development in latin america this paper develops an analytical framework for analyzing rural livelihoods in terms of their sustainability and their implications for rural poverty the framework argues that our analyses of rural livelihoods need to understand them in terms of a people s access to five types of capital asset b the ways in which they combine and transform those assets in the building of livelihoods that as far as possible meet their material and their experiential needs c the ways in which people are able to expand their asset bases through engaging with other actors through relationships governed by the logics of the state market and civil society and d the ways in which they are able to deploy and enhance their capabilities both to make living more meaningful and to change the dominant rules and relationships governing the ways in which resources are controlled distributed and transformed in society particular attention is paid to the importance of social capital as an asset through which people are able to widen their access to resources and other actors

the market for tradable renewable energy credits abstract as states seek to foster the development of renewable energy resources some have introduced renewable portfolio standards rpss which require retailers of electricity to derive a specified amount of their energy supply from renewable energy resources rpss in texas arizona wisconsin and nevada allow for or require the use of tradable renewable energy credits the price of such credits is expected to reflect the cost premium for generating electricity from renewable resources relative to the market price of conventionally generated electricity using the market to trade renewable energy credits exposes buyers and sellers to risks of imperfect information poor performance and opportunism these risks can be managed through contractual arrangements and regulatory requirements pertaining to property rights in credits pricing term of the contract and assurance of performance

assessing the advantages and drawbacks of government trading of guarantees of origin for renewable electricity in europe abstract the european commission has proposed a new renewable energy directive which includes flexibility provisions allowing the cost effective attainment of the ambitious target for renewable energy of 20 of energy consumption which has been set for the year 2020 one of the flexibility provisions currently being considered is to allow countries to reach their individual targets by buying their renewable electricity deployment deficit from other countries with a surplus i e with a renewable electricity deployment above their targets this trade is likely to take the form of an exchange in guarantees of origin gos gos are currently implemented in member states to fulfil the renewable electricity directive requirement that each country has a system that allows the tracing of the source of each kwh of renewable electricity and informs on this source although the recent and tiny literature on the analysis of go trading has focused on trade between firms the exchange of gos between governments has not received a comparable attention this paper analyses the advantages and drawbacks of a system of government trading of gos with respect to company trading

on the complexities of complex economic dynamics complex economic nonlinear dynamics endogenously do not converge to a point a limit cycle or an explosion their study developed out of earlier studies of cybernetic catastrophic and chaotic systems complexity analysis stresses interactions among dispersed agents without a global controller tangled hierarchies adaptive learning evolution and novelty and out of equilibrium dynamics complexity methods include interacting particle systems self organized criticality and evolutionary game theory to simulate artificial stock markets and other phenomena theoretically bounded rationality replaces rational expectations complexity theory influences empirical methods and restructures policy debates

danish energy reform policy implications for renewables abstract for decades renewables have been promoted in denmark by the feed in model fixed price scheme with favourable tariffs for green electricity this has resulted in successful penetration of wind power covering more than 13 of danish electricity consumption 2001 changing the promotional scheme to a quota based system with tradable green certificates has been on the political agenda since 1999 this article discusses danish energy policy with focus on the implications for the penetration and deployment of renewables it has turned out to be more complicated than anticipated to create an efficient operational system for trade in green certificates and the starting date for trading has been postponed several times the national green certificates market was to be fully operational by the beginning of 2003 however political negotiations in the fall of 2001 seem to postpone the initiation of the certificate market until 2005 transitional rules for green electricity during the period from 2003 to 2005 are under negotiation after a national election in november 2001 this situation has created widespread uncertainty among potential investors in green electricity the article evaluates a number of problems related to the shift in danish energy policy

the renewable portfolio standard design considerations and an implementation survey renewables have social and environmental bene ts compared to conventional electricity sources but are rarely competitive on a strict nancial cost basis this is because conventional sources are sometimes subsidized their full pollution costs are ignored and renewables involve newer higher cost technologies whose relative costs will fall with commercialization governments use several mechanisms to support renewables including direct nancial support grants loans indirect support r d demonstrations reform of nancial costs of conventional sources subsidy removal pollution taxes and the renewable portfolio standard rps the rps requires a minimum share of electricity from renewable energy sources its use is spreading because it maintains an incentive for renewable producers to reduce costs links the regulated market outcome to an environmental target and reduces government involvement although it is too early to evaluate fully its e ectiveness the survey for this study explored implementation issues in three european countries nine us states and australia and found the following the rps target is usually set to have environmental bene ts without causing signi cant price increases cost caps are sometimes used most jurisdictions limit eligibility to gridconnected domestic renewables the rps is usually applied to producers rather than consumers and to energy output not capacity flexibility mechanisms are desired but a challenge to implement administration in the us and australia is by government with delegation to independent utility regulators while in europe it is more the responsibility of government everywhere the rps is applied alongside other mechanisms of renewables support 2001 elsevier science ltd all rights reserved

sustainable user innovation from a policy perspective a systematic literature review abstract sustainable innovation is typically viewed through the lens of the producer innovator whereas end users or consumers are perceived to play only a peripheral role in the development of sustainable products and services a growing literature stream however sharply departs from this view by suggesting that end users often play a critical role with regard to sustainable innovation to further consolidate this field the purpose of this paper is threefold first the paper summarizes and synthesizes key insights within the field based on 84 papers published from 1992 to 2015 second we offer a framework to understand the current observed barriers and drivers to this innovation process suggesting two distinct end user innovation types independent and facilitated the end users motivation ability and opportunity to innovate serve as the deductive analytical tool utilized for discerning these drivers and barriers third the paper suggests how this form of innovation may be ameliorated from a policy perspective the paper reveals that the literature on end user innovation within sustainability is both diverse and compartmentalized hence policy mechanisms designed to support this type of innovation process need to be tailored to the independent or facilitated framework in which the end user resides and to take into account how each framework is necessitated by a different actor logic and motivation resulting in the pursuit of different innovation types it is concluded that the literature focusing on independent end user innovation typically highlights policy aimed at enabling end users with the necessary skills and resources to innovate whereas literature focusing on facilitated end user innovation typically emphasizes creating platforms that enable the effective introduction of end user knowledge into an already existing framework the paper offers an overview and a framework for researchers to further explore this diverse and compartmentalized field practitioners may especially benefit from the proposed policy tools including the overview of potential tools for drawing on end user competences and resources

breakthrough without subsidies pv business model experiments in the netherlands despite a lack of steady governmental support for pv in the netherlands over the last decade from 2008 onwards an increased number of initiatives started experimenting with new business models for pv though absolute numbers of installed capacity are still low this is a promising sign in this article we aim to contribute to the understanding of these developments by using insights from both business model and transition studies literature i e strategic niche management by performing a literature study and a series of interviews we found three main types of business models customer owned community shares and third party financial viability of these was found to be heavily dependent on net metering regulations which are surrounded by uncertainty and struggle about its meaning and application also the overall pv niche is maturing we found several local and national organizations lobbying for expansion of the space for pv business model experiments and enabling knowledge sharing and networking between initiatives furthermore a number of regime players is getting involved in the pv niche considering the current economic turndown and related subsidy cuts in many other countries we believe the netherlands with its relatively poor and unstable support system could serve as an example

comparing real wage rates a real wage rate is a nominal wage rate divided by the price of a good and is a transparent measure of how much of the good an hour of work buys it provides an important indicator of the living standards of workers and also of the productivity of workers in this paper i set out the conceptual basis for such measures provide some historical examples and then provide my own preliminary analysis of a decade long project designed to measure the wages of workers doing the same job in over 60 countries workers at mcdonald s restaurants the results demonstrate that the wage rates of workers using the same skills and doing the same jobs differ by as much as 10 to 1 and that these gaps declined over the period 2000 2007 but with much less progress since the great recession jel c81 c82 d24 j31 n30 o57

design of an economically efficient feed in tariff structure for renewable energy development abstract evidence suggests albeit tentatively that feed in tariffs fits are more effective than alternative support schemes in promoting renewable energy technologies rets fits provide long term financial stability for investors in rets which at the prevailing market price of electricity are not currently cost efficient enough to compete with traditional fossil fuel technologies on the other hand if not properly designed fits can be economically inefficient as is widely regarded to have been the case under the public utility regulatory policies act of 1978 purpa under purpa too high a guaranteed price led to the creation of so called purpa machines poorly performing generating units that could survive financially only because of heavy subsidies that came at the expense of retail customers similarly because of their adverse impacts on retail electricity rates german fits have been subject to increasing political pressure from utilities and customers in this paper we propose an innovative two part fit consisting of both a capacity payment and a market based energy payment which can be used to meet the renewables policy goals of regulators our two part tariff design draws on the strengths of traditional fits relies on market mechanisms is easy to implement and avoids the problems caused by distorting wholesale energy markets through above market energy payments the approach is modeled on forward capacity market designs that have been recently implemented by several regional transmission organizations in the usa to address needs for new generating capacity to ensure system reliability

economic reform and food prices evidence from markets in ghana abstract this paper investigates trends in food prices in ghana during 1970 1993 regression results confirm that real wholesale prices of food have been declining since the 1970s price trends in the 1980s are characterized by a downward shift at the beginning of the postreform period and a subsequent continuing downward trend despite falling grain prices we find that agricultural wage rates failed to provide an adequate basis for subsistence particularly during periods of large seasonal price rises many farmers hold grain for both speculation and to smooth income this view is supported by evidence regarding seasonal price spreads that have been increasing since 1984 we find no support however for conclusions of trader manipulation of marketing margins during the adjustment period

a prism into the ppp puzzles the micro foundations of big mac real exchange rates we match big mac prices with prices of its ingredients as a unique prism to study real exchange rates rers this approach has several advantages first the levels of the big mac rer can be measured meaningfully second as the exact composition of a big mac is known the contributions of its tradable and non tradable components can be estimated relatively precisely third the dynamics of the rer can be studied in a setting free of several biases inherent in cpi based rers finally a large cross country dimension allows us to overturn the engel result on what drives rers in most economies the exchange rate is the single most important relative price one that potentially feeds back into a large range of transactions obstfeld and rogoff 2000

running to keep in the same place consumer choice as a game of status if individuals care about their status defined as their rank in the distribution of consumption of one positional good then the consumer s problem is strategic as her utility depends on the consumption choices of others in the symmetric nash equilibrium each individual spends an inefficiently high amount on the status good using techniques from auction theory we analyze the effects of exogenous changes in the distribution of income in a richer society almost all individuals spend more on conspicuous consumption and individual utility is lower at each income level in a more equal society the poor are worse off

peak electricity demand and social practice theories reframing the role of change agents in the energy sector abstract demand managers currently draw on a limited range of psychology and economic theories in order to shift and shed peak electricity demand these theories place individual consumers and their attitudes behaviours and choices at the centre of the problem this paper reframes the issue of peak electricity demand using theories of social practices contending that the problem is one of transforming technologically mediated social practices it reflects on how this body of theory repositions and refocuses the roles and practices of professions charged with the responsibility and agency for affecting and managing energy demand the paper identifies three areas where demand managers could refocus their attention i enabling co management relationships with consumers ii working beyond their siloed roles with a broader range of human and non human actors and iii promoting new practice needs and expectations it concludes by critically reflecting on the limited agency attributed to change agents such as demand managers in dominant understandings of change instead the paper proposes the need to identify and establish a new group of change agents who are actively but often unwittingly involved in reconfiguring the elements of problematic peaky practices

economic structure and the politics of sectoral bias east asian and other cases governments of poor countries generally practise urban biased policies that penalise the agricultural sector to the advantage of non agriculture conversely governments of rich countries generally practise rural bias as south korea and taiwan have become relatively wealthy over recent decades they have also shifted from urban biased to rural biased policies adherents of the rational choice approach to political analysis claim to provide an explanation of the causes of this pattern this explanation is based on changing patterns of political interests and coalition forming possibilities induced by the changes in economic structure characteristically associated with economic growth an evaluation of this claim in the light of the south korean and taiwanese cases suggests that a it has considerable validity although its explanatory power is easily exaggerated b a satisfactory rational choice approach would encompass a wider range of political actors than has been incorporated in existing analy

sustainability assessment of renewable energy projects for off grid rural electrification the pangan an island case in the philippines abstract renewable energy systems ress have been promoted for rural electrification as an answer to the growing energy needs of communities while simultaneously satisfying environmental and resource scarcity problems these off grid systems however have several challenges in the perspective of sustainability due to the technically and financially weak recipients and users of the projects there is still however less detailed understanding how the technical and economic aspects of the projects can properly match the social aspects to promote sustainability this paper aimed to further understand the challenges and social impacts of rural electrification projects using res through a case study of a centralized off grid solar plant in the philippines the study used multiple correspondence analysis mca to identify essential user attributes which explain the users electricity consumption behaviors the community cooperative had difficulties maintaining the facility in the long term due to financial and capacity related challenges a holistic approach dealing with the technical economic and social aspects in developing res projects promote sustainability

domestic micro generation economic regulatory and policy issues for the uk abstract micro generation in individual homes has been the subject of increasing policy and industry attention in recent years whilst it has been estimated that micro generation could meet 30 40 of uk electricity demand by 2050 deployment to date has been slow in its micro generation strategy the uk government has started to outline how deployment could be increased various technical economic behavioural and institutional changes are needed to establish a uk market for micro generation this article discusses how different deployment models for domestic micro generation might attract investments in these technologies it considers not only investments by individual households but also by energy companies starting from an economic analysis of payback times for three different technologies micro chp micro wind and solar pv it identifies policy and regulatory recommendations it argues for technology specific support policies in the short term it also suggests that a level playing field for micro generation technologies as a result of fiscal and market reforms could considerably increase the attractiveness of micro generation technologies

trust in a rent seeking world health and government transformed in northeast brazil abstract this article draws lessons from a set of innovative programs carried out by a state government in brazil now widely acclaimed for excellence in public management key to the high performance was strong worker commitment to the job and what the state did to elicit a topic of little note in the development literature but of central importance in the literature of industrial performance and workplace transformation in the industrialized countries the state created an unusual sense of calling among the program s workers new prestige in the communities where they worked and an informed citizenry that both monitored the workers and trusted them

a review of international green power markets recent experience trends and market drivers green power marketing the act of differentially selling electricity generated wholly or in part from renewable sources has emerged in more than a dozen countries around the world almost two million customers worldwide buy green power today this paper reviews green power marketing activity in australia canada japan the us and in a number of countries in europe to gain an understanding of consumer demand for electricity generated from renewable sources it also examines key factors that influence market penetration of green power products such as product designs pricing incentives marketing strategies policies and product certification 2002 elsevier science ltd all rights reserved

environmental valuation and rationality economic valuation of the envi structuring the empirical model or adding ronment is disputed in part due to the number auxiliary hypotheses the presumption is of anomalies reactions to these anomalies have that consistent preferences are there just included adding new auxiliary hypotheses to the to be uncovered thus errors are mea core model or dismissing the whole undertaking surement this paper takes a third route and uses observa biases to be corrected by retions made in valuation studies to improve choice fined methods mitchell and carson theory the paper covers the information prob 1989 certainly many studies can be critlem the issue of preference formation and under icized for being of low quality still the lines the role of the social sphere in defining what development of concepts like starting becomes individually rational while the findings point bias posit ion bias question ormay not simplify theory they may help us be der bias yea saying protest bids come more realistic and to understand errors pro and part whole bias all seem very ad duced by illegitimate simplifications

what if utility vision 2020 future climate frameworks the localization of energy policy energy water linkages consumer driven innovation are among the key words that keep utility strategists awake this essay is an attempt to put these questions into context and derive a possible alternative investment strategy c 2008 elsevier ltd all rights reserved

exploring the link between products and services in low income markets evidence from solar home systems one of the key challenges of energy access in emerging markets and developing countries is how to reach households and communities that are unlikely to get a grid connection in the long term or those that are connected to the grid but suffer from regular blackouts or low voltage by surveying entrepreneurs selling solar home systems shss on a commercial basis in emerging and developing countries this study is one of the first attempts to quantify the key elements of four potential product service systems psss cash credit leasing and fee for service whereas the fee for service approach was found to be suitable only under certain conditions all psss share two key elements for successful market deployment one or more years of maintenance and customer support in financing these customers new asset moreover it appears that private sector companies are in principle able to deliver shss to households with incomes greater than usd 1000 per year the implications for policy makers and development aid agencies are first to include maintenance services into public programmes or public private partnerships and second to explicitly consider financial risks for entrepreneurs e g customer commitment and repayment conditions

institutional influences on business model choice by new ventures in the microgenerated energy industry abstract business model choice plays an important source of competitive advantage for new ventures in the microgeneration sector yet existing literature focuses on strategic management of internal resources as the constraints in this choice process in the energy sector external factors may be at least as influential in shaping these business models this paper examines the roles of politico institutional and socio institutional dynamics in the choice of business models for microgeneration ventures business models have traditionally been viewed as constructions of the internal values strategies and resources of organizations but this perspective overlooks the role that external forces have on these models particularly in more highly institutionalized contexts like microgeneration when these factors are introduced into the existing framework for business model choice the business model based less on firm decision making and more about variables that exist within national innovation systems and political structure local socio technological conditions and cognitive abilities of the entrepreneur and corresponding stakeholders

a conceptual framework for community based health insurance in low income countries social capital and economic development summary the international policy model linking community based health insurance cbhi and universal coverage for health care in low income countries is implicitly determined by the development of mutual health insurance in 19th century europe and japan the economic and health system frameworks employed in cbhi policy have not sufficiently taken into account contextual considerations social capital theories could contribute to understanding why generally cbhi does not achieve significant and sustainable levels of population coverage a framework of social capital and economic development is used to organize and interpret existing evidence on cbhi this suggests that solidarity trust extra community networks vertical civil society links and state society relations affect the success of cbhi aligning schemes to social determinants of cbhi could result in structures that differ from those proposed by current analytic frameworks

weak comparability of values as a foundation for ecological economics the main argument of this paper is that weak comparability of values should be seen as one characteristic feature of ecological economics the formal properties of the concepts of strong comparability implying strong or weak commensurability and weak comparability implying incommensurability will be clarified multicriteria evaluation offers the methodological and mathematical tools to operationalize the concept of incommensurability at both macro and micro levels of analysis the concept of incommensurability of values already has a long tradition in economics moreover we will show that analytic philosophy theories of complexity post normal science and the recent theories of rationality lead with different trajectories to a non algorithmic approach which in our view could be implemented by some forms of multicriteria evaluation 1998 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

green certificate trading in the netherlands in the prospect of the european electricity market the support system for green electricity in the netherlands has been one of the most complex and complicated systems across europe a voluntary trade of green certificates or green labels was one of the schemes used in the policy models of the 1990s the liberalization of the electricity market has attracted substantial changes in the degree and nature of commitment by energy companies and political authorities for renewable electricity in 2001 a new mechanism for the voluntary trade of green certificates has become operational replacing the green label trade system one terminated in the end of 2000 this paper presents the two systems of green certificates trade developed in the netherlands and discusses their market stimulation potential in the very different economic and industrial circumstances that has surrounded each of them the paper argues for a need to enable a support system that reduces investment risks as much as possible and removes the residual but still strong institutional administrative and social barriers for renewables deployment but before this a clear governmental vision on the role of renewables in current energy supply systems is first needed backed by a coherent policy and sufficient support along the economic dimension of renewables market diffusion

sustainability guided promotion of renewable electricity generation in recent years the threat of global climate change high fuel import dependence and rapidly rising electricity demand levels have intensified the quest for more sustainable energy systems this in turn has increased the need for policy makers to promote electricity generation from renewable energy sources guaranteed prices coupled with a buy back obligation for electricity fed into the grid is a popular renewables promotion instrument especially in europe more recently driven mainly by electricity market liberalisation efforts quota targets for the share of renewables in combination with tradable green certificates tgc have received considerable attention tgc offer a greater theoretical potential for economic efficiency gains due to price competition and the greater flexibility assigned to the obliged parties while guaranteed prices and tgc schemes support the operation of renewable energy technology systems bidding schemes for renewable energy generation capacity are used to raise economic efficiency on the plant construction side all of these policy instruments suffer from the shortcoming that they do not explicitly account for the often widely varying environmental social and economic impacts of the technologies concerned in this paper we propose a methodology for the design of renewable energy policy instruments that is based on integrated assessment in particular we argue that using participatory multicriteria evaluation as part of the design of renewable energy promotion policies would make it possible 1 to differentiate the level of promotion in a systematic and transparent manner according to their socio ecological economic impact and 2 to explicitly account for the preferences of stakeholders a further problem of existing tgc and bidding schemes is that diversity of supply could be severely diminished if few low cost technologies were allowed to dominate the renewable energy market to ensure a certain diversity of technologies our scheme suggests the use of different technology bands for technologies that are relatively homogeneous with respect to their maturity

responding to policy change new business models for renewable energy cooperatives barriers perceived by cooperatives members abstract renewable energy cooperatives recs in germany have received considerable attention in recent years their number having risen to nearly a thousand since 2004 this growth has resulted largely from germany s feed in tariff system recent changes in this policy however have made the previous rec business models mostly unprofitable so recs are looking for new business models our study aims at identifying those new models and characterizing the implementation barriers recs face to this end we interviewed rec members and management and observed rec annual general meetings we found three significant barriers first risk aversion on the part of both members and management second concerns about the environmental impacts or the ethics of certain models that while legal are not felt to align with the intentions of lawmakers finally the lack of competencies and time of the mostly unsalaried rec management these barriers could put the future of recs at risk and so threaten the contributions recs make to the german energy transition professionalization partnerships and other strategies can help mitigate this risk if recs are to continue to play an important role in the energy transition policy makers would be wise to consider measures to support their continued growth

threshold cointegration and causality relationship between energy use and growth in seven african countries abstract the paper investigates the long run and the causality relationship between energy consumption and economic growth for seven sub saharan african countries during the period 1970 2007 using the gregory and hansen 1996a 1996b testing approach to threshold cointegration we find that energy consumption is cointegrated with economic growth in cameroon cote d ivoire ghana nigeria and south africa moreover this test suggests that economic growth has a significant positive long run impact on energy consumption in these countries before 1988 and this effect becomes negative after 1988 in ghana and south africa furthermore causality tests suggest bidirectional causality between energy consumption and real gdp in cote d ivoire and unidirectional causality running from real gdp to energy usage in the case of congo and ghana

structuring west germany s energy objectives for this article a comprehensive and politically legitimate list of criteria to evaluate energy systems was constructed from interviews with leading representatives of a broad spectrum of west german society in the interviews we probed the fundamental values of nine political and social organizations including the catholic and lutheran churches the federation of german labour unions the association of german industries and the german nature society a hierarchical representation of value criteria was logically structured for each group separately and then aggregated into a combined value tree the result facilitates communication and constructive compromise promotes the creation of policy options and helps evaluate future energy systems

the place premium bounding the price equivalent of migration barriers large international differences in the price of labor can be sustained by differences between workers or by natural and policy barriers to worker mobility we use migrant selection theory and evide

how important is human capital for development evidence from immigrant earnings this paper offers new evidence on the sources of cross country income differences it exploits the idea that observing immigrant workers from different countries in the same labor market provides an opportunity to estimate their human capital endowments these estimates suggest that human and physical capital account for only a fraction of cross country income differences for countries below 40 of the us output per worker less than half of the output gap relative to the us is attributed to human and physical capital

the patchy spread of renewables a socio territorial perspective on the energy transition process abstract in the energy transition process the district heating networks and the wind power facilities play a key role these two technologies can contribute to establish models of co provision involving new social actors in the energy field despite that the socio organizational change appears patchy in italy these options are dominated by large utilities and the few forms of energy co production are to be found in specific contexts the influence of socio territorial features on the energy transition seem relevant this paper aims analysing energy transition while focusing on the institutional relational and territorial dimensions to unfold how energy innovations take place within territorial contexts in this respect energy transition is investigated considering both the district heating and the wind power in italy the analysis suggests that the transition is influenced by the way in which territorial context is destabilized by the perturbations of energy landscape

understanding the uneven diffusion of building scale renewable energy systems a review of household local and country level factors in diverse european countries abstract this review focuses on renewable energy technology deployment in residential buildings which is part of current targets to develop net zero carbon buildings in europe and to promote the deployment of renewable energy we focus on the adoption of four technologies heat pumps solar photovoltaics solar thermal systems for domestic hot water and space heating and advanced biomass heating while there are several studies on households investment criteria a research gap exists because building owners across europe are quite diverse and the european markets exhibit different stages of maturity this article conducts a critical review of the literature on the diffusion of building scale renewable energy solutions in order to answer the following questions 1 to what extent can findings from studies on household adoption criteria be generalized from one country to another and 2 what insights does the literature offer on factors that might explain the differences in adoption patterns between european countries

the fruits and fallacies of neoliberalism the case of irrigation policy abstract neoliberal doctrine provides the analytic basis for a convincing explanation and critique of irrigation policy in the third world there is a strong case for subjecting capital and recurrent decisions to the discipline of scarcity pricing however it is rarely practicable to apply scarcity pricing rigorously because of the economic and technical infeasibility of volumetric water pricing in most third world irrigation schemes the taiwanese experience illustrates that political and institutional mechanisms for promoting managerial performance can be effective where the neoliberal prescription fails

green certificates and carbon trading in the netherlands abstract the combination of trading schemes for green certificates and for carbon as they are implemented and planned in the netherlands imply a complete separation of green certificates and co 2 markets this means that the costs of co 2 reduction will be reflected in the spot price of electricity and that the price of green certificates only reflects the additional cost of re development however since the green certificate scheme is already implemented while the carbon trading scheme is not it is unclear if currently the green certificate value includes the co 2 reduction value of re production it is important that buyers and sellers in the market for green certificates agree on what they are trading therefore this issue should be clarified

co provision in sustainable energy systems the case of micro generation electricity generation by individual households known as micro generation is attracting an increasing amount of interest within government industry and the research community this paper focuses on the potential for micro generation to contribute to a more active role for household energy consumers in the development and operation of the energy system the paper applies the concept of energy service co provision to aid an understanding of this more active role it considers a number of alternative models for micro generation investment that imply different kinds of co provision by consumers and energy companies the analysis focuses in particular on the economics of these models in the uk the associated barriers to micro generation investment and the scope for overcoming these barriers through changes in fiscal rules having conducted this economic analysis the paper concludes with a brief discussion of the wider implications of these models for consumer behaviour in particular it considers the impact of it and control systems that might be employed to facilitate energy service co provision that includes micro generation

economic instruments for environmental regulation our knowledge about economic incentive approaches to pollution control has grown rapidly in the two decades in which they have received serious analytical attention not only have the theoretical models become more focused and the empirical work more detailed but we have now had over a decade of experience with emissions trading in the u s and emission charges in europe as the world community becomes increasingly conscious of both the need to tighten environmental controls and the local economic perils associated with tighter controls in a highly competitive global marketplace it seems a propitious time to stand back and to organize what we have learned about this practical and promising approach to pollution control that may be especially relevant to current circumstances this paper draws upon economic theory empirical studies and actual experience with implementation to provide a brief overview of some of the major lessons we have learned about two economic incentive approaches emissions tradi copyright 1990 by oxford university press

social capital as obstacle to development brokering land norms and trust in rural india summary based on a study of how rural land brokers mediate the arrival of a special economic zone in rural rajasthan this paper argues that theories of collective social capital cannot explain how networks norms and trust interact in a process of economic change it then reconstructs bourdieu s distinct theory of individual social capital by showing how better connected farmers are able to broker land and capture profits at the expense of fellow villagers undermining trust norms and collective action it argues that social capital is most plausibly seen as an aspect of social inequality that hinders inclusive development

economic structure and factor payments there is a growing body of evidence that the labour payment share in national income varies across countries and over time suggesting that the popular aggregate cobb douglas production function may not capture income share dynamics there remains conflicting evidence on the importance of natural resource rents among low income economies and on estimates of the rate of return to produced capital this paper focuses on the structural differences among countries confirming the importance of the agriculture sector in estimates of labour and land s share of factor income based on 81 countries at diverse levels of economic development in the year 2005 i find that cross country data are best modelled by a ces production function with an elasticity of substitution of 0 8 and that many low income countries have a higher return to capital than the united states

developing pathways for energy storage in the uk using a coevolutionary framework abstract a number of recent techno economic studies have shown that energy storage could offer significant benefits to a low carbon uk energy system as it faces increased challenges in matching supply and demand however the majority of this work has not investigated the real world issues affecting the widespread deployment of storage this paper is designed to address this gap by drawing on the systems innovation and socio technical transitions literature to identify some of the most important contextual factors which are likely to influence storage deployment specifically it uses a coevolutionary framework to examine how changes in ecosystems user practices business strategies institutions and technologies are creating a new selection environment and potentially opening up the energy system to new variations of storage for both electricity and heat the analysis shows how these different dimensions of the energy regime can coevolve in mutually reinforcing ways to create alternative pathways for the energy system which in turn have different flexibility requirements and imply different roles for storage technologies using this framework three pathways are developed user led decentralised and centralised which illustrate potential long term trajectories for energy storage technologies in a low carbon energy system

micro hydro power in the uk the role of communities in an emerging energy resource research around micro hydro power is focused on technical aspects with limited understanding of the social organisation and environmental implications we examine the ways in which micro hydro is engaged by people and organisations as a means of contributing to the uk s policy ambition for renewable energy we bring to the fore the way in which expertise is used and contested a web based review of micro hydro schemes in the uk was undertaken and a detailed evaluation of two schemes in the north of england was conducted to determine how expertise and contestation figures in community schemes results demonstrate a rapid expansion of micro hydro in the uk ownership control is highly community based until now research around micro hydro has been dominated by technical approaches with schemes defined in terms of hardware we propose a third dimension to walker and cass s 2007 classification of renewable energy developments the environmental dimension we suggest this dimension of micro hydro is critical both in terms of the extent to which resources can be realised but also the ways in which it might attract controversy in particular around how expertise is used and valued

comparing drivers barriers and opportunities of business models for renewable energies a review abstract this article systematically reviews the emerging field of research on business models for renewable energies differentiating between developing and industrialized countries the key findings on developing countries are as follows first there is a lack of quantitative data second opportunities are driven primarily by unfulfilled basic needs and micro finance whereas corruption and weak electricity grids are the main barriers and third business models should be replicable the key findings on industrialized countries are as follows first opportunities are driven primarily by climate change mitigation and energy efficiency improvements second stuck thought patterns and high costs of energy storage are important barriers and third cooperation is a key in future business models to handle increasing complexity this review reveals implications for researchers and policy makers promising avenues for future research are the analysis of intermodal business models and opportunities concerning energy self supply and renewable district heating policy makers are advised to design legal frameworks that account for the global nature of the renewable energy challenge and are simultaneously adapted to regional disparities

an energy pricing scheme for the diffusion of decentralized renewable technology investment in developing countries the purpose of this paper is to investigate price support for market penetration of renewable energy in developing nations through a decentralized supply process we integrate the new decentralized energy support renewable premium tariff to analyze impacts of tariff incentives on the diffusion of renewable technology in senegal based on photovoltaic and wind technologies and an assessment of renewable energy resources in senegal an optimization technique is combined with a cash flow analysis to investigate investment decisions in renewable energy sector our findings indicate that this support mechanism could strengthen the sustainable deployment of renewable energy in remote areas of senegal although different payoffs emerged profits associated with a renewable premium tariff are the highest among the set of existing payoffs moreover in analyzing impacts of price incentives on social welfare we show that price tariffing schemes must be strategically scrutinized in order to minimize welfare loss associated with price incentives finally we argue that a sustainable promotion of incentive mechanisms supporting deployment of renewable technology in developing nations should be carried out under reliable institutional structures the additional advantage of the proposed methodology is its ability to integrate different stakeholders producers investors and consumers in the planning process

utilities business models for renewable energy a review abstract the transformation of today s electric power sector to a more sustainable energy production based on renewable energies will change the structure of the industry consequently utilities as the major stakeholders in this transformation will face new challenges in their way of doing business they will have to adapt their business models to remain competitive in the new energy landscape the present review of business model literature shows that two basic choices exist utility side business models and customer side business models the two approaches follow a very different logic of value creation while the former is based on a small number of large projects the latter is based on a large number of small projects the article reveals that blueprints for utility side business models are available whereas customer side business models are in an early stage of development applying the business model framework as an analytical tool it is found that existing utility side business models comprise a series of advantages for utilities in terms of revenue potential and risk avoidance this study provides new insights about why utilities will favor utility side business models over customer side business models and why they also should engage in customer side business models in their quest for more sustainable future business models

estimation of a labour supply model with censoring due to unemployment and underemployment this study proposes and implements a method of labour supply estimation which is appropriate when the sample contains unemployed and underemployed workers the estimation method consists of excluding unemployed and underemployed workers from the sample and then using to avoid selection bias an extension of heckman s approach to the case where two correlated selection rules generate the sample hausman s specification test is then used to determine whether ignoring constrained workers has led to biases in traditional labour supply estimates and the empirical results suggest that previous estimates of several important parameters are biased since the biases go in the direction that would be predicted by the hypothesis that the unemployed and underemployed are constrained the results support this hypothesis

rural versus urban preferences for renewable energy developments development of renewable energy resources such as wind farms and hydro electric schemes are being promoted as a new method of expanding and diversifying employment in rural areas however such energy projects are associated with a range of environmental impacts which might be detrimental to other economic activities such as those based on nature tourism the authors use a choice experiment to quantify peoples preferences over environmental and employment impacts that may result from the deployment of renewable energy projects in rural areas of scotland focussing in particular on any differences between the preferences of urban and rural dwellers and on heterogeneity within these groups rural and urban households are shown to have different welfare gains which are dependent on the type of renewable energy technology and on the scale of project under consideration

uk innovation systems for new and renewable energy technologies drivers barriers and systems failures abstract a better understanding of the systemic processes by which innovation occurs is useful both conceptually and to inform policy making in support of innovation in more sustainable technologies this paper analyses current innovation systems in the uk for a range of new and renewable energy technologies and generates policy recommendations for improving the effectiveness of these innovation systems although incentives are in place in the uk to encourage innovation in these technologies system failures or gaps are identified in moving technologies along the innovation chain preventing their successful commercialisation sustained investment will be needed for these technologies to achieve their potential it is argued that a stable and consistent policy framework is required to help create the conditions for this in particular such a framework should be aimed at improving risk reward ratios for demonstration and pre commercial stage technologies this would enhance positive expectations stimulate learning effects leading to cost reductions and increase the likelihood of successful commercialisation