annual and cropping season environmental production conditions effects on smallholder technical efficiency in sub saharan africa evidence from ethiopia this article investigates the impact of environmental production conditions on smallholder farmers technical efficiency in ethiopia for wheat maize and sorghum farming we use a household panel data set with annual and cropping season environmental production conditions to estimate the technical efficiency scores the results show that including environmental production conditions in the stochastic frontier has a significant impact on farmers technical efficiency scores technical efficiency scores improve when environmental production conditions are incorporated in the stochastic frontier thus accounting for environmental production conditions reduces the inefficiencies that otherwise may be attributed to the characteristics of smallholder farmers

innovation in the energy sector lessons learnt from r d expenditures and patents in selected iea countries abstract long time series of the iea and international patent offices offer a huge potential for scientific investigations of the energy innovation process thus this paper deals with a broad literature review on innovation drivers and barriers and an analysis of the knowledge induced by public research and development expenditures r d and patents in the energy sector the cumulative knowledge stock induced by public r d expenditures in 14 investigated iea countries is 102 3 bn eur in 2013 nuclear energy has the largest share of 43 9 bn eur followed by energy efficiency accounting for 14 9 bn eur fossil fuels with 13 5 bn eur and renewable energy with 12 1 bn eur a regression analysis indicates a linear relation between the gdp and the cumulative knowledge with each billion eur of gdp leading to an additional knowledge of 3 1 mil eur however linearity is not given for single energy technologies further the results show that appropriate public r d funding for research and development associated with a subsequent promotion of the market diffusion of a niche technology may lead to a breakthrough of the respective technology

public policy supports and export performance of bioenergy technologies a dynamic panel approach abstract this study investigates the effects of public policy supports on the export performance of bioenergy technologies it uses panel data from 18 countries from the 1992 to 2008 period panel unit root and cointegration tests are applied taking into account the results of structural break tests for each time series and testing for the presence in the panel of cross sectional dependence time series data on public supports and exports are integrated and cointegrated the results of dynamic ordinary least squares indicate that in the long term public r d expenditures have a positive effect on the exports the contribution of bioenergy to the total energy supply has a negative effect on the exports and gdp has a positive effect on the exports the contribution of bioenergy to total energy supply responds to deviations in the previous period from the long term equilibrium additionally blundell bond system generalized methods of moments estimations are made to determine dynamic causality in a panel vector error correction mechanism setting evidence of a positive strong and short term relationship from exports to r d expenditures and of a positive short term causality from exports to the contribution of bioenergy to total energy supply is found a positive strong bidirectional relationship between gdp and exports is also uncovered there is a positive strong bidirectional and short term relationship between gdp and the contribution of bioenergy to total energy supply finally some policy implications based on the results of this study are offered

environmental kuznets curve in romania and the role of energy consumption abstract the aim of present study is to probe the dynamic relationship between economic growth energy consumption and co 2 emissions for period of 1980 2010 in case of romania in doing so ardl bounds testing approach is applied to investigate the long run cointegration between these variables our results confirm long run relationship between economic growth energy consumption and energy pollutants the empirical evidence reveals that environmental kuznets curve ekc is found both in long and short runs in romania further energy consumption is major contributor to energy pollutants democratic regime shows her significant contribution to decline co 2 emissions through effective implementation of economic policies and financial development improves environment i e reduces co 2 emissions by redirecting the resources to environment friendly projects

bioenergy policy and market development in finland and sweden abstract the use of biomass in finland and sweden has steadily increased over the past 25 years up to approximately 20 of the primary energy supply in 2001 in both countries most biomass originates from forests forest biomass is now an integral part of modern energy systems although primarily in industry and in the heating sector for example biomass accounts for 7 9 and 53 of the fuel mix in district heating in finland and sweden respectively the general energy policy of both countries has supported biomass for energy over the entire period although specific policies have changed with time research development and demonstration has been continuously supported and some subsidy schemes have been applied in particular for district heating systems dhs and combined heat and power heavy taxation of competing fossil fuels seems to have been the most effective policy instrument although this has been directed mainly at the heat and transportation fuel markets electricity taxes are imposed on consumption industry is largely exempt and do not discriminate significantly between the sources of electricity starting in 2003 sweden will have a quota based system a renewable portfolio standard which is expected to increase biomass based electricity production both countries possess vast and not fully exploited biomass resources in the form of forests and have a history of rational and large scale forestry strong actors exist both with regard to forest ownership and the industrial processing of forest products the user side in particular represented by dhs can also be characterised by strong and professional management over time structures have developed that facilitate an increased use of biomass for energy for example the forest industry infrastructure and extensive district heating actors within these structures have had the ability to react to policies resulting in a stable growth in biomass use

feed in or certificates competition or complementarity combining a static efficiency and a dynamic innovation perspective on the greening of the energy industry abstract european policy on the greening of the energy industry has been characterised by a debate between proponents of two apparent polar opposites feed in tariffs and certificate markets different european countries have chosen both mechanisms and as a consequence the european union has maintained a fairly pluralist position abstaining from stricter harmonisation taking a dynamic innovation perspective on european energy industry we argue that feed in tariffs and certificate markets should not be seen as competing alternatives but rather as complementary regulatory instruments targeting subsequent steps in the product cycle on the way from early technology conceptualisation and development towards competitive positioning in mature energy markets we see both policy instruments as necessary to achieve the extensive transformation towards sustainable development that is judged as important tools in the context of the global climate challenge

ethical reporting in islami bank bangladesh limited 1983 2010 the main aim of this study is to undertake a critical examination of the ethical and developmental performance of an islamic bank as communicated in its annual reports over a period of 28 years 1983 2010 islami bank bangladesh limited s ibbl hereafter ethical performance and disclosures are further analyzed through interviews conducted with the bank s senior management the key findings include an overall increase in ethical disclosures during the study period however the focus on various stakeholders needs has varied over time reflecting the evolving nature of the islamic finance industry over the last three decades based on a secular economy ibbl focused in the first two decades on the particular shariah compliance disclosure as a way of establishing its reputation and differentiating itself from conventional banks in a dual banking system post 2005 the ethical performance and disclosure shifted to more universal disclosures such as sustainability charity employees and community related disclosures signaling responsible conduct and the bank s adoption of a wider stakeholder approach however the bank is still failing to provide full disclosure on certain significant categories such as sources and uses of disposable income thereby contradicting the principles of full and comprehensive disclosure and accountability in addition the structure of ibbl s investment portfolio reveals an overreliance on debt based financial instruments and a shortcoming in fulfilling the developmental and social objectives of islamic finance this is evidenced by the qualified shariah supervisory board reports that the bank consistently received this research provides further evidence that islamic banking and finance in its current practices reflect the global and the local influences in an era dominated by global conventional finance

technological learning and renewable energy costs implications for us renewable energy policy abstract this paper analyzes the relationship between current renewable energy technology costs and cumulative production research development and demonstration expenditures and other institutional influences combining the theoretical framework of learning by doing and developments in learning by searching with the fields of organizational learning and institutional economics offers a complete methodological framework to examine the underlying capital cost trajectory when developing electricity cost estimates used in energy policy planning models sensitivities of the learning rates for global wind and solar photovoltaic technologies to changes in the model parameters are tested the implications of the results indicate that institutional policy instruments play an important role for these technologies to achieve cost reductions and further market adoption

understanding cross national trends in high tech renewable power equipment exports to the united states we track us imports of advanced technology wind and solar power generation equipment from a panel of countries during 1989 2010 and examine the determining factors including country size sector specific us fdi outflow and domestic wind and solar power generation differentiating between the core high tech and the balance of system equipment we find us imports of both categories have grown at significantly higher rate from the relatively poorer countries and particularly china and india larger countries are found to be exporting significantly more and us fdi is found to play a significant positive role in the exports of high tech equipment for the poor countries for the core wind and solar high tech equipment we find domestic renewable power generation of the exporting countries also played a significant positive role

bottom up estimation of industrial and public r d investment by technology in support of policy making the case of selected low carbon energy technologies abstract this paper discusses a bottom up approach to estimate the level of r d investment by technology in areas where data are scarce it develops a four step methodology for the estimation of corporate r d investments at technology level this approach can overcome gaps in existing data by combining publicly available information in a novel way even though it introduces some uncertainty this is illustrated for a set of low carbon energy technologies that were identified as key for meeting europe s long term energy and climate objectives by the european strategic energy technology plan the paper finds that the aggregated r d investments dedicated to these technologies amounted to 3 3 billion in the eu in 2007 including public funding from european union member states and at eu level and industrial research activities from companies with headquarters registered in the eu the results allow conclusions on the european energy research policy to be drawn such as the dominance of industrial funds and have provided significant input to the european policy making in this field the paper ends with suggestions on how to further enhance the accuracy of the approach and how to widen its application to other sectors

drivers promoting renewable energy a dynamic panel approach we study the commitment to renewable energy sources focusing on a set of 24 european countries and applying panel dynamic estimators europe is a leading player in the fight against climate change and the estimators we use reveal themselves to be appropriate in handling the persistency effect on renewables the level of renewable energy use in the previous period has a positive and highly significant effect on the current level of use traditional energy sources restrain the impetus towards renewables social awareness of sustainability climate change mitigation and co2 reduction targets are not enough to motivate the switch from traditional to renewables energy sources income and prices of fossil based fuels were not significant for the development of renewables in the period from 1990 to 2006 suggesting that it was not the market that encouraged renewables

renewable energy consumption and income in emerging economies abstract increased economic growth and demand for energy in emerging economies is creating an opportunity for these countries to increase their usage of renewable energy this paper presents and estimates two empirical models of renewable energy consumption and income for a panel of emerging economies panel cointegration estimates show that increases in real per capita income have a positive and statistically significant impact on per capita renewable energy consumption in the long term a 1 increase in real income per capita increases the consumption of renewable energy per capita in emerging economies by approximately 3 5 long term renewable energy per capita consumption price elasticity estimates are approximately equal to 0 70

threshold effect of the economic growth rate on the renewable energy development from a change in energy price evidence from oecd countries this paper uses a panel threshold regression ptr model to investigate the influence that energy prices have on renewable energy development under different economic growth rate regimes the empirical data are obtained from each of the oecd member countries over the period from 1997 to 2006 we show that there is one threshold in the regression relationship which is 4 13 of a one period lag in the annual gross domestic product gdp growth rate the consumer price index cpi in so far as it relates to variations in energy is significantly positively correlated with the contribution of renewables to energy supply in the regime with higher economic growth but there is no relationship in the regime with lower economic growth therefore countries characterized by high economic growth are able to respond to high energy prices with increases in renewable energy use while countries characterized by low economic growth countries tend to be unresponsive to energy price changes when they come to their level of renewable energy

causality between public policies and exports of renewable energy technologies this article investigates the causal relationship between public policies and exports of renewable energy technologies using panel data from 18 countries for the period 1991 2007 a number of panel unit root and cointegration tests are applied time series data on public policies and exports are integrated and cointegrated the dynamic ols results indicate that in the long run a 1 increase in government r d expenditures rad increases exports ex by 0 819 ex and rad variables respond to deviations from the long run equilibrium in the previous period additionally the blundell bond system generalized methods of moments gmm is employed to conduct a panel causality test in a vector error correction mechanism vecm setting evidence of a bidirectional and short run and strong causal relationship between ex and the contribution of renewable energy to the total energy supply cres is uncovered cres has a negative effect on ex whereas ex has a positive effect on cres we suggest some policy implications based on the results of this study

is the choice of renewable portfolio standards random this study investigated factors influencing the adoption or intention to adopt renewable portfolio standards rps by individual states in the united states u s theory of adoption of innovation was applied as a conceptual framework a logistic model was used to achieve the task gross state product gsp growth rate of population grp political party dominancy education level natural resources expenditure and share of coal in electricity generation were used as explanatory variables results indicated that the model predicts the dependent variable state s choice of adopting or not adopting rps 82 times correctly out of 100 results also suggested that education followed by political party dominancy gsp and grp are shown to have large impacts on the probability of rps adoption

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

dynamic analysis of policy drivers for bioenergy commodity markets abstract biomass is increasingly being considered as a feedstock to provide a clean and renewable source of energy in the form of both liquid fuels and electric power in the united states the biofuels and biopower industries are regulated by different policies and have different drivers which impact the maximum price the industries are willing to pay for biomass this article describes a dynamic computer simulation model that analyzes future behavior of bioenergy feedstock markets given policy and technical options the model simulates the long term dynamics of these markets by treating advanced biomass feedstocks as a commodity and projecting the total demand of each industry as well as the market price over time the model is used for an analysis of the united states bioenergy feedstock market that projects supply demand and market price given three independent buyers domestic biopower domestic biofuels and foreign exports with base case assumptions the biofuels industry is able to dominate the market and meet the federal renewable fuel standard rfs targets for advanced biofuels further analyses suggest that united states bioenergy studies should include estimates of export demand in their projections and that ghg limiting policy would partially shield both industries from export dominance

the impact of energy prices on the volatility of ethanol prices and the role of gasoline emissions abstract the contribution of renewable energy resources is vital for a country s economic growth by providing high efficiency in energy as well as an effective tool for the confrontation of climate change in particular concerning the eu an increase in the consumption of renewable energy resources as a proportion of the total energy consumption by its member states was set as an objective until 2020 ethanol has been widely used as a substitute to conventional energy like gasoline and oil the present paper surveys the role of alternative energy prices and gas emissions in the formation of the ethanol prices the results of the empirical survey confirmed the existence of a sole relationship among the variables employed according to the results obtained an increase in the volume of emissions or in gasoline prices results in an increase in ethanol prices while the opposite is confirmed in the case of crude oil he elasticity of ethanol prices to the increase of the emissions is another result worth mentioning indicative of the significant role of the emissions in the formation of ethanol prices

developments in international solid biofuel trade an analysis of volumes policies and market factors abstract this paper presents and analyses international solid biofuel trade and concludes upon interactions with bioenergy policies and market factors it shows that trade has grown from about 56 to 300 pj between 2000 and 2010 wood pellets grew strongest i e from 8 5 to 120 pj other relevant streams by 2010 included wood waste 77 pj fuelwood 76 pj wood chips 17 pj residues 9 pj and roundwood 2 4 pj intra eu trade covered two thirds of global trade by 2010 underlying markets are highly heterogeneous generally though trade evolved whenever supply side market factors coincided with existing emerging demand patterns market factors and policies both defined trade volumes though policy changes did not have as prominent effects on trade developments as in the liquid biofuel sector economic viability is the key limiting factor main exporting countries have low feedstock costs and already existing wood processing industries trade relevant aspects are the commodity s monetary value determined by its homogeneity heating value and bulk density consumer markets are diverse in residential heating demand trade patterns have been influenced by local biofuel availability and short term price signals i e mainly price competitiveness and investment support for boilers stoves commodities are mainly sourced regionally but price differences have triggered a growing trade the industrial segment is greatly influenced by policy frameworks but more mature e g established routes trade is strictly linked to margins defined mainly by policies and combustion technologies uncertainties in the analysis are due to data gaps across and within databases regarding import export declarations to estimate bioenergy related trade anecdotal data was indispensable we believe datasets should be streamlined across international institutions to eventually enable reporting of global trade beyond digit 6 level research is needed to provide further insights into informal markets interrelations between trade factors are particularly relevant when mapping future trade streams under different policy trade regime scenarios

examining the bi directional long run relationship between renewable energy consumption and gdp growth abstract the bi directional long run relationship between renewable energy consumption and gdp growth has been investigated in high income upper middle income lower middle income and high income countries to achieve this goal the fully modified ols was utilized the results revealed that 79 of the countries have a positive bi directional long run relationship between renewable energy consumption and gdp growth this represents the feedback hypothesis on the other hand 19 of the countries showed no long run relationship between the variables this represents the neutrality hypothesis besides 2 of the countries showed a one way long run relationship from gdp growth to renewable energy consumption confirming the conservation hypothesis and from renewable energy consumption and gdp growth representing the growth hypothesis despite the mixed results across countries it has been proved that the more persistent and significant the bi directional long run relationship between the variables is the higher the income countries are

green innovation transformation economic sustainability and energy consumption during china s new normal stage abstract as china s economy is transforming into a new normal stage the energy industry is becoming increasingly innovation driven which is shown particularly in renewable energy given that the green innovation transformation is crucially critical during china s new normal stage this paper analyzes the direct impact of energy consumption on energy innovation and innovation transformation and reveals the net effect of green innovation transformation on economic sustainability and energy consumption micro and macro empirical evidence are both provided in this paper by implementing two estimation methodologies fixed effect model and generalized method of moments gmm vector autoregression var approach respectively estimating chinese micro 153 listed energy companies data and macro 30 provincial data from 2009 to 2016 we find that 1 in terms of energy enterprises innovation activity behavior energy consumption could promote total energy innovation of which renewable energy innovation is stimulated far more significantly 2 there is an increasing tendency for energy structure to transform into renewables as the energy consumption increases 3 the green innovation transformation instead of total innovation counts can reduce energy consumption and benefit economic sustainability therefore the structure of innovation transformation plays more significant role than total energy innovation in stimulating economic growth and alleviating the energy consumption antinomy during china s new normal stage in this regard in order to stimulate green energy transformation government should implement financing policy reduce administrative intervention upgrade energy legal system and improve energy pricing mechanism to encourage more research and development r d activities at the core of renewable energy

environmental regulation and the export dynamics of energy technologies abstract the pollution haven hypothesis affirms that an open market regime will encourage the flow of low technology polluting industries toward developing countries because of potential comparative advantages related to low environmental standards in contrast the hypothesis suggested by porter and van der linde claims that innovating firms operate in a dynamic competitive situation which allows global diffusion of environmental friendly technologies environmental regulation may represent a relevant mechanism through which technological change is induced in this way countries that are subject to more stringent environmental regulations may become net exporters of environmental technologies this paper provides new evidence on the evolution of export flows of environmental technologies across different countries for the energy sector advanced economies particularly the european union have increasingly focused on the role of energy policies as tools for sustaining the development path the kyoto protocol commitments together with growing import dependence on energy products have brought attention to the analysis of innovation processes in this specific sector the analysis uses a gravity model in order to test the determinants and the transmission channels through which environmental technologies for renewable energies and energy efficiency are exported to advanced and developing countries our results are consistent with the porter and van der linde hypothesis where environmental regulation represents a significant source of comparative advantages what strongly emerges is that the stringency of environmental regulation supplemented by the strength of the national innovation system is a crucial driver of export performance in the field of energy technologies

international bioenergy trade a review of past developments in the liquid biofuel market policies aimed to promote biofuels locally had tremendous effects on global market developments across the past decade this article develops insights into the interaction of these policies and market forces via a comprehensive collection and analysis of international production and trade data it shows that world biofuel production and trade has grown exponentially from below 30 pj in 2000 to 572 pj in 2009 for biodiesel from 340 pj in 2000 to over 1540 pj in 2009 for fuel ethanol the eu has dominated world biodiesel whereas the us and brazil have led fuel ethanol production world net biofuel trade reached 120 130 pj in 2009 and was directed towards the most lucrative markets for biodiesel this has been the eu whose imports rose to 92 pj in 2008 and remained at 70 pj in 2009 regarding fuel ethanol both the us and the eu have been prime destinations for competitively priced exports the vast majority of which originated in brazil international biofuel trade is both supply and demand driven the demand side was shaped by support policies which generally increased the domestic market value of biofuels trade developed wherever these policies prices were not accompanied by respective measures it is found that import duties largely influenced trade volumes whereas trade routes were mainly driven by tariff preferences trade regimes appear to have been designed and adapted unilaterally along national interests causing market disruptions trade inefficiencies and disputes to avoid these it is important to explicitly consider international trade implications of national trade policies a prerequisite is to improve the understanding of the underlying complex and interwoven links within the market the current lack of adequate homogeneous international reporting of biofuel production and trade statistics could be bridged via internationally standardized custom clarifications trade factor interrelations also need to be investigated further

going green trade specialisation dynamics in the solar photovoltaic sector abstract the present study aims at providing a comprehensive analysis of trade flows and the domestic value creation of the major solar photovoltaic industry at the world level solar technologies convert light and heat from the sun into useful energy the use of the sun s energy can not only reduce the consumption of conventional fuels thus reducing the emission of detrimental greenhouse gases but it can also enable a gain in enhanced fuel and energy security along with lessening costs in addition green technologies and industries can promote economic growth and international competitiveness and can offer new business and employment opportunities it becomes therefore extremely important to deeply explore the dynamics of the solar photovoltaic sector specifically the present work analyses the main global trends of this sector and sketches the key players on the world market including producers installers and top traders based on an analysis of trade flows at the 6 digit level the international specialisation patterns are investigated and the role of various market and trade drivers including subsidies in the uptake of solar technologies is identified and examined

fostering a renewable energy technology industry an international comparison of wind industry policy support mechanisms this article examines the importance of national and sub national policies in supporting the development of successful global wind turbine manufacturing companies we explore the motivations behind establishing a local wind power industry and the paths that different countries have taken to develop indigenous large wind turbine manufacturing industries within their borders this is done through a cross country comparison of the policy support mechanisms that have been employed to directly and indirectly promote wind technology manufacturing in 12 countries we find that in many instances there is a clear relationship between a manufacturer s success in its home country market and its eventual success in the global wind power market whether new wind turbine manufacturing entrants are able to succeed will likely depend in part on the utilization of their turbines in their own domestic market which in turn will be influenced by the annual size and stability of that market consequently policies that support a sizable stable market for wind power in conjunction with policies that specifically provide incentives for wind power technology to be manufactured locally are most likely to result in the establishment of an internationally competitive wind industry

a review of biofuel policies in the major biofuel producing countries of asean production targets policy drivers and impacts since the turn of this century development of biofuels have progressed rapidly in indonesia malaysia philippines and thailand the major biofuels producing countries in the asean association of south east asian nations the article analyses the biofuel polices underlying drivers and way forward for sustained biofuel development in these countries favorable regulatory and economic mechanisms have played an important role in the production utilization and market penetration of biofuels in these countries a large variety of biofuel support policies are in place ranging from policy targets blending mandates tax incentives and other financial schemes to stimulate the development and adoption of biofuels indonesia is leading the region in biodiesel production and thailand is leading in ethanol production though each of these countries have had occasional setbacks in their production in totality there has been positive growth in biofuel production and an upward trend in future is likely with increased demand consumption enforcement of mandates and realization of policy targets the biofuel development of these countries is motivated by several factors mainly their concerns for energy security e g to reduce the dependence of oil imports and socio economic development e g to increase income generating opportunities climate change is not the primary motive of these countries to pursue biofuel development however sustainable production of biofuels and reliance on second generation biofuels can provide opportunities for these countries to translate their growth potential into economic revenues under carbon finance and thus address greenhouse gas emissions and climate change concerns

opportunities and barriers for international bioenergy trade recently the international trade of various bioenergy commodities has grown rapidly yet this growth is also hampered by some barriers the aim of this paper is to obtain an overview of what market actors currently perceive as major opportunities and barriers for the development of international bioenergy trade the work focuses on three bioenergy commodities bioethanol biodiesel and wood pellets data were collected through an internet based questionnaire the majority of the 141 respondents had an industrial background geographically two thirds were from mainly western europe with other minor contributions from all other continents results show that import tariffs and the implementation of sustainability certification systems are perceived as potentially major barriers for the trade of bioethanol and biodiesel while logistics are seen mainly as an obstacle for wood pellets development of technical standards was deemed more as an opportunity than a barrier for all commodities most important drivers were high fossil fuel prices and climate change mitigation policies concluding to overcome some of the barriers specific actions will be required by market parties and policy makers import tariffs for biofuels could be reduced or abolished linked to multinational trade agreements and harmonization including provisions on technical standards and sustainability requirements