using real option analysis for highly uncertain technology investments the case of wind energy technology this study examines the feasibility of using a theoretical model and empirical analysis methods to value renewable energy re investment from perspective of real option analysis roa based on use of a roa approach the re value is evaluated with respect to its ability to conform to the main sensitivity analysis of re investment as well as an empirical method devised to value re investment by using actual data the economic intuitiveness underlying the decision making process for re investment is elucidated while empirical analysis is performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the options value embedded in current development planning in taiwan for wind energy in addition to revealing the advantages of re development when considering real option analytical results indicate that roa is a highly effective means of quantifying how investment planning uncertainty including managerial flexibility influences re development besides evaluating the value of current re investment this study demonstrates that results of the theoretical model empirical analysis and sensitivity analysis correlate well with each other restated the value of developing re increases when increasing the underlying price time to maturity risk free rate and volatility conversely the value of developing re decreases when increasing the exercise price

evaluation of a hybrid seed contract between smallholders and a multinational company in east java indonesia this article evaluates a hybrid seed contract between indonesian smallholders and pioneer hybrid international a transaction cost approach was used to analyse contract participation total farm gross margins and labour and chemical use the empirical results suggest a the contract favours farmers with more irrigated land b the contract improved returns to farm capital and was welfare improving c the contract increased the demand for non family labour particularly female labour and d the contract increased the intensity of chemical use the success of the contract was attributed to the nature of the contracting process which was between pioneer and grower groups and not individual smallholders

opening the black box of carbon finance additionality the political economy of carbon finance effectiveness across tanzania uganda and moldova summary this paper identifies conditions under which the clean development mechanism and other carbon finance projects effectively generate genuine additional carbon credits relying on a systematic empirical investigation of afforestation reforestation and bioenergy carbon finance projects across tanzania uganda and moldova at low global carbon prices additionality was related to the interests of project developers and their resulting capacities and motivations for project implementation certain organizations with capacity for mitigation projects were curiously not involved with carbon finance a distinction between neo developmental tanzania and liberal neo developmental uganda and moldova political economy preferences explains variation in the presence or absence of effective project developers

levelized cost of electricity lcoe of renewable energies and required subsidies in china newhuadu business school research fund china sustainable energy program g 1305 18257 national social science foundation of china 12zd059 ministry of education 10 jbg 013

china s carbon emissions trading overview challenges and future because china has emerged as the largest greenhouse gas ghg emitter in total annual emissions to accelerate the pace of ghg emission reduction in china is important to the success of global efforts in addressing climate change carbon trading is a market mechanism and key instrument in the mitigation of climate change this paper explores the policy process and development state to date of china s carbon trade market to understand the emergence and development of that market and to understand what barriers are hampering china s carbon trade market development to achieve this goal this paper introduces and analyzes china s status in the international market examines the factors driving carbon market launching by the chinese government and traces the development of mandatory carbon emission trading and voluntary emission trading it is argued that china s carbon trading market is confronted with challenges such as the absence of a functional carbon trading market inaccuracy of the quota allocation an imperfect trading mechanism and lagging legislation at the present stage shortcomings such as having no real time carbon price and dominated spot transactions differentiate china s trade market substantially from a functional system a quick market integration of china s carbon market appears remote it is suggested that specific measures be taken to promote the development of the chinese carbon trading market

handling financial resource mobilisation in technological innovation systems the case of chinese wind power to mitigate climate change a rapid and large scale expansion of sustainable innovations such as renewable energy technologies is crucial china s track record of wind power development shows both speed and scale that can provide valuable knowledge of how to stimulate and maintain transformation of energy systems the growth was made possible partly by ample access to financial capital however the rapid growth also led to growing pains and made the industry face increasing financial constraints while these constraints partly relate to structures and trends that are external to the wind power innovation system they were also a consequence of the particular path taken in chinese wind power development the case demonstrates that if a full fledged industry is to be developed and sustained a balanced growth is required and all innovation system functions need due attention sooner or later conceptually the article contributes by further exploring how mobilisation of financial resources affect and is affected by overall system dynamics

collective action for market chain innovation in the andes the papa andina network employs collective action in two novel approaches for fostering market chain innovation the participatory market chain approach pmca and stakeholder platforms engage small potato producers together with market agents and agricultural service providers in group activities to identify common interests share market knowledge and develop new business opportunities these forms of collective action have generated commercial technological and institutional innovations and created new market niches for andean native potatoes grown by poor farmers in remote highland areas these innovations have benefited small farmers as well as other market chain actors this paper describes papa andina s experiences with collective action for market chain innovation it then discusses the implications of these experiences for the understanding of collective action and the policy implications for research and development organizations

a real options valuation of chinese wind energy technologies for power generation do benefits from the feed in tariffs outweigh costs abstract in order to assess the viability of wind energy projects in china this paper takes a real options approach by accounting for flexibility over deployment of the technology in response to a stochastic non renewable energy cost the difference between the latter and the r d enhanced cost of renewable energy operation may be thought of as a benefit from using wind on the other hand the chinese government provides feed in tariffs to encourage further adoption of wind which should be included as a cost this work thus shows that there is substantial options value to china s wind energy program which is bolstered if the cost of carbon dioxide emissions is internalized moreover by varying the rate of feed in tariffs the model may be used to show plausible ranges for the feed in tariffs which could be a useful policy insight furthermore the study hypothesizes that with the likelihood of renewable energy to replace non renewable energy wind power in china can potentially reduce co2 emissions by approximately 6 4 by 2020 comparing to the 2005 level and highlights the significant role of wind power in china s emission targets and energy security this is a relevant paper especially given the importance of a sustainable energy transition for china more generally using the real options approach from a policy perspective could provide insights about the viability of renewable energy programs and robustness of feed in tariffs rates

natural resource management and household well being the case of posaf ii in nicaragua summary measuring the impact of natural resource programs is a key element in the formulation and implementation of policies designed to promote farm income while enhancing the quality of the surrounding environment in this paper we analyze the economic impact of natural resource technologies delivered by the socio environmental and forestry development program ii posaf ii in nicaragua we use cross sectional data for 1 483 households from 212 treated and control communities results obtained from propensity score matching psm ordinary least squares ols weighted least squares regression wls based on psm and instrumental variables iv regression indicate that posaf ii has had a positive impact on the total value of agricultural production of beneficiary farmers an internal rate of return analysis supports the hypothesis that increasing household income while encouraging the sustainable use of natural resources through the implementation of suitable management programs can be complementary development objectives

renewable energy policy evaluation using real option model the case of taiwan abstract this study presents a policy benefit evaluation model that integrates cost efficiency curve information on renewable power generation technologies into real options analysis roa methods the proposed model evaluates quantitatively the policy value provided by developing renewable energy re in the face of uncertain fossil fuel prices and re policy related factors the economic intuition underlying the policy making process is elucidated while empirical analysis illustrates the option value embedded in the current development policy in taiwan for wind power in addition to revealing the benefits that re development provides when considering real options analytical results indicate that roa is a highly effective means of quantifying how policy planning uncertainty including managerial flexibility influences re development in addition to assessing the policy value of current re development policy this study also compares policy values in terms of internalized external costs and varying feed in tariff fit simulation results demonstrate that the re development policy with internalized co2 emission costs is appropriate policy planning from sustainability point of view furthermore relationship between varying fit and policy values can be shown quantitatively and appropriate fit level could be determined accordingly

investment in wind power and pumped storage in a real options model abstract promoting renewable energy has been a key ingredient in energy policy seeking to de carbonize the energy mix and will continue to do so in the future given the european union s high ambitions to further curb carbon emissions a wide range of instruments has been suggested and implemented in various countries of the eu a prominent policy promoting investment in renewable technologies is the use of feed in tariffs which has worked well at large scale in e g germany but which has only been implemented in a very limited way in countries such as the uk being subject to environmental uncertainties however renewables cannot be seen in isolation while renewables based technologies such as wind and solar energy for example suffer from uncertain loads depending on environmental conditions hydropower allows for the storage of water for release at peak prices which can be treated as a premium partially offsetting higher upfront investment costs in addition electricity prices will respond to changes in electric capacity in the market which is often neglected in standard investment models of the electricity sector this paper contributes to the existing literature in two ways it provides a review of a renewables based technology in a specific policy context and provides additional insight by employing a real options approach to investigate the specific characteristics of renewables and their associated uncertainties in a stylized setting taking explicitly into account market effects of investment decisions the prices of the model are determined endogenously by the supply of electricity in the market and by exogenous electricity price uncertainty the inclusion of market effects allows us to capture the full impact of public incentives for companies to invest into wind power and hydro pumped storage installations

the impact of high value markets on smallholder productivity in the ecuadorean sierra a stochastic production frontier approach correcting for selectivity bias abstract this paper uses data from small scale potato farmers in ecuador to examine the impact of the program plataformas de concertacion on productivity growth using propensity score matching combined with a stochastic production frontier model that corrects for sample selection bias we disaggregate the yield growth attributable to the program into technological change tc and technical efficiency te while the results do not exhibit a clear indication of selection bias the analysis does show that on average beneficiaries exhibit higher yields than control farmers given the same input levels but lower te with respect to their own frontiers these results suggest that while the program raised the technology gap in favor of beneficiaries it had a negative effect on te in the short run the latter finding is consistent with the notion that beneficiaries enjoyed a significant change in production techniques but it is very likely that they were still in the learning by doing stages at the time the data was collected in fact the results suggest a fast recovery in te levels on the part of beneficiaries as time with project increased

a real option model for renewable energy policy evaluation with application to solar pv power generation in china abstract this study proposes a policy evaluation model from the perspective of government and investors the proposed model which integrates american option method and two factor learning curve method can be used to evaluate the unit decision value and save path rate for renewable energy development and examine the existence of balance point of interest several uncertain factors including non renewable energy cost carbon price renewable energy cost and price subsidy are all considered in this model the model has been applied to evaluate the solar photovoltaic pv power generation in china our empirical results show that real option analysis roa is more effective than net present value analysis npv when handling uncertainty under current level of subsidy the government would suffer loss and the investors could benefit so that it is difficult to achieve the balance of interest during the planning period with the reduction of subsidy rate they can achieve the balance of interest

the impact of chinese carbon emission trading scheme ets on low carbon energy lce investment china is planning to introduce emission trading scheme ets to decrease co2 emission as low carbon energy lce will play a pivotal role in reducing co2 emissions our paper is to assess the extent and the conditions under which a carbon ets can deliver lce investment in china we chose wind technology as a case study and a real option based model was built to explore the impact of a number of variables and design features on investment decisions e g carbon and electricity price carbon market risk carbon price floor and ceiling and on grid ratio we compute critical values of these variables and features and explore trade offs among them according to our work a carbon ets has a significant effect on wind power plant investment although it cannot support investment in wind power on its own carbon price stabilization mechanisms such as carbon price floor can significantly improve the effect of carbon ets but the critical floor to support investment is still much higher than the carbon price in china pilot etss our results show that other policy measures will be needed to promote low carbon energy development in china

regulation and corruption higher levels of government expenditures and more regulation naturally invite corruption because they provide the opportunity for government officials to be paid off for regulatory favors subsidies and government contracts some countries have relatively large governments but lower levels of corruption scandinavian countries offer examples while institutional differences may explain some of the cross country differences in corruption the most consistent relationship is that high levels of regulation are associated with more corruption when looking at the effect of the size of government it is the regulatory state rather than the productive or redistributive state that is associated with corruption

money for nothing politicians rent extraction and political extortion introduction the model 1 background the economic theory of regulation 2 rent extraction the theory of political extortion demonstrations 3 observing extortion the practice of rent extraction 4 validating the model empirical tests of rent extraction 5 contracting for rent preservation the durability problem extensions 6 extraction and optimal taxation excises earmarked taxes and government user charges 7 costs and benefits of interest group organization 8 improving the model worthy yet unanswered questions notes references index

empirical determinants of corruption a sensitivity analysis many variables have been proposed by past studies as significant determinants of corruption this paper asks if their estimated impact on corruption is robust to alteration of the information set a global sensitivity analysis based on the leamer s extreme bounds analysis gives a clear answer five variables are robustly related to corruption corruption is lower in richer countries where democratic institutions have been preserved for a long continuous period and the population is mainly protestant corruption is instead higher where political instability is a major problem finally a country s colonial heritage appears to be a significant determinant of present corruption

corruption and destructive entrepreneurship the negative effects of corruption at the macro level are well documented corruption reduces economic growth lowers investment and erodes trust in government officials creating an institutional environment that pushes entrepreneurs from productive to destructive activities corruption also has effects at the micro level because some industries are better situated to profit from corruption than others corruption not only lowers economic output but also shifts resources toward some industries and away from others using federal convictions in the usa as a measure of corruption regression results show that increased corruption shifts resources toward the construction industry and away from the education industry and professional scientific and technical service industry the evidence also shows that the distance from state capitals and voter turnout moderate the relationship between corruption and firm concentrations

the impact of regulatory quality and corruption on residential electricity prices in the context of electricity market reforms abstract the european electricity markets have been undergoing significant regulatory reforms since the introduction of the first liberalisation directive in 1996 theory predicts that liberalisation promotes cost efficient production and competition and hence leads to lower prices the goal of this paper is to assess the impact of regulatory quality and non compliance with the law on electricity prices in the context of electricity market reforms we address problems of endogeneity by using the blundell blond system gmm estimator and find that vertical integration and market concentration lower end user prices all else equal moreover improving regulatory quality and reducing corruption both have a negative impact on prices when holding other factors constant the intensity of the reforms has limited impact on electricity prices when these reforms are introduced in an institutional environment characterised by high levels of corruption and low quality regulation

wind farm investment risks under uncertain cdm benefit in china abstract china has set an ambitious target to increase its wind power capacity by 35 gw from 2007 to 2020 the country s hunger for clean power provides great opportunities for wind energy investors however risks from china s uncertain electricity market regulation and an uncertain energy policy framework mainly due to uncertain clean development mechanism cdm benefits prevent foreign investors from investing in china s wind energy the objectives of this paper are to 1 quantify wind energy investment risk premiums in an uncertain international energy policy context and 2 evaluate the impact of uncertain cdm benefits on the net present values of wind power projects with four scenarios this study simulates possible prices of certified emissions reductions cers from wind power projects project net present values npvs have been calculated the project risk premiums are drawn from different and uncertain cer prices our key findings show that uncertain cdm benefits will significantly affect the project npvs this paper concludes that the chinese government needs revising its tariff incentives most likely by introducing fixed feed in tariffs fits and re examining its cdm granting policy and its wind project tax rates to facilitate wind power development and enable china to achieve its wind energy target

subsidies in carbon finance for promoting renewable energy development abstract faced with decreasing exhaustible nonrenewable resources and climate change resulting from the use of fossil energy it is urgent to accelerate the development of renewable energy but the development of renewable energy requires abundant financial support both from banks and governments this article considers bank loans to develop renewable energy and highlights the effects of government subsidies by using a microeconomic model and taking all stakeholders including the government banks and shareholders of the firm into consideration this study finds that government subsidies raise outputs and debt levels of renewable energy firms and improve shareholder value as well more importantly financial debts stimulate firms outputs but decrease the net profit per unit of debt due to the limited liability effects finally subsidy policy plays a critical role in renewable energy development because environmental efficiencies of subsidies decrease with the subsidy degree other valuable conclusions would be achieved if principal agent problem and other corporate governance factors are employed

the evolving role of carbon finance in promoting renewable energy development in china abstract the world is negotiating what the international climate change regime will look like after 2012 the year that current kyoto protocol greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets expire and the future of the clean development mechanism cdm is under discussion critics claim the scale of reductions that the cdm is driving in the developing world is insufficient from a scientific perspective if we are to avoid dangerous climate change that the project by project crediting process is inefficient and that the reductions being achieved are not additional meaning they would have happened anyway and thus should not be financially supported yet the efficacy of cdm must be examined in the broader context of carbon mitigation in the developing world and the actions that are taking place this paper examines the role that the cdm has played in promoting renewable energy development in china in order to assess how international carbon finance can best be used to help promote emissions mitigation in the developing world it also assesses how several options under consideration for reforming the current structure of the cdm in particular and developing country engagement in general may impact renewable energy development in china in the coming years

corruption as an occupational choice endogenous corruption and tax policy corruption is endemic in many countries and empirical studies have demonstrated how it impacts on macroeconomic indicators theoretical studies have generally assumed an exogenously given proportion of the population are corrupt or that the public sector is fixed in size far fewer explore how corruption emerges endogenously we endogenize corruption as an occupational choice workers choose private or public employment public employees can be honest or corrupt corruption is subject to a social sanction that results in a loss of self esteem those who care little about the social sanction choose to be corrupt when a firm meets a corrupt public employee it pays a bribe to secure a reduction in the tax rate the economy has two self sustaining equilibria with different levels of corruption corruption reduces tax revenue and the tax rate that maximizes revenue an increase in the social sanction reduces corruption but also reduces tax revenues if the economy is in a high corruption equilibrium paying a wage premium to public sector workers can result in all public sector workers being corrupt public sector audits to detect corrupt workers always reduce corruption but can only increase welfare when they are cheap to conduct and the economy is in a low corruption equilibrium

renewable energy investments under different support schemes a real options approach abstract this paper adopts a real options approach to analyze investment timing and capacity choice for renewable energy projects under different support schemes the main purpose is to examine investment behavior under the most extensively employed support schemes namely feed in tariffs and renewable energy certificate trading we consider both multiple sources of uncertainty under each support scheme and uncertainty with respect to any change of support scheme and we obtain both analytical when possible and numerical solutions in a nordic case study based on wind power we find that the feed in tariff encourages earlier investment nevertheless as investment has been undertaken renewable energy certificate trading creates incentives for larger projects in our baseline scenario and taking the fixed feed in tariff as a base the revenue required to trigger investments is 61 higher with renewable certificates at the same time investment capacity is 61 higher

european co2 prices and carbon capture investments we assess the option to install a carbon capture and storage ccs unit in a coal fired power plant operating in a carbon constrained environment we consider two sources of risk namely the price of emission allowance and the price of the electricity output first we analyse the performance of the eu market for co2 emission allowances specifically we focus on the contracts maturing in the kyoto protocol s first commitment period 2008 to 2012 and calibrate the underlying parameters of the allowance price process then we refer to the spanish wholesale electricity market and calibrate the parameters of the electricity price process we use a two dimensional binomial lattice to derive the optimal investment rule in particular we obtain the trigger allowance prices above which it is optimal to install the capture unit immediately we further analyse the effect of changes in several variables on these critical prices among them allowance price volatility and a hypothetical government subsidy we conclude that at current permit prices immediate installation does not seem justified from a financial point of view this need not be the case though if carbon market parameters change dramatically carbon capture technology undergoes significant improvements and or a specific governmental policy to promote these units is adopted

from lagging to leading technological innovation systems in emerging economies and the case of chinese wind power there is increasing attention for the contribution of emerging economies to global innovation including innovation of renewable energy technologies the technological innovation systems tis framework presents a list of system functions for the analysis of the development of a technology it has often been applied to renewable energy technologies but with a strong focus on advanced economies in this paper we elaborate on emerging economy innovation system formation structured according to tis functions rather than analysing development of the technology we analyse the development of the chinese tis vis a vis the global forefront key to this notion is that tis especially for clean tech are transnational phenomena lagging tis depend on the global tis whereas leading tis contribute to its formation it is concluded that china has reduced its dependence on foreign knowledge and investment but the outward contribution remains limited the main challenge to foreign market expansion lies in reforming the domestic tis to focus on turbine quality rather than cost reduction demonstration projects are needed especially for large capacity and offshore turbine models in order to build up operational history and get quality certification

corruption and democracy abstract most models and empirical tests of the relationship between corruption and democracy assume corruption falls as democracy matures yet recent theoretical developments and case evidence suggest an inverted u relationship between the two although so far no one has tested for this relationship by drawing on a panel data set covering a large number of countries between 1982 1997 substantial empirical support is found for an inverted u relationship between the durability age of democracy and corruption fortunately the turning point in corruption occurs rather early in the life of new democracies between 10 12 years

can carbon pricing support onshore wind power development in china an assessment based on a large sample project dataset abstract there is much discussion about whether the rapid expansion of onshore wind power in china is sustainable given the decrease in feed in tariffs fit it is unclear whether the recently launched nationwide carbon pricing system which will include 1700 power companies can compensate for decreasing fits and possibly provide new incentives for wind power developments this paper investigates the ability of carbon pricing policies to compensate for declining fits in support of onshore wind power investment in china first we constructed a dataset of 2059 onshore wind power projects from china s thirty provinces between 2006 and 2015 to estimate the levelized costs of electricity lcoe this dataset was used to assess the profitability of each wind project for different carbon prices varying levels of fits curtailment rate and discount rate our findings suggest that the carbon price can compensate partially for the revenue loss caused by declining fits as well as improving the profitability of projects however current carbon prices in china s carbon emission trading pilots are not sufficiently high to compensate for the revenue losses especially under the grid parity scenario consequently without fits the sustainable development of onshore wind power in china is uncertain a sensitivity analysis of the effect of the carbon pricing policy demonstrates that in the case of higher investment risk and more serious curtailment the effect of carbon pricing policy on promoting the wind power investment seems to be more significant

agricultural commercialization and diversification processes and policies abstract agricultural commercialization and diversification involve the gradual replacement of integrated farming systems by specialized enterprises for crop livestock poultry and aquaculture products changes in product mix and input uses are determined largely by the market forces during this transition commercialization of agricultural production is an endogenous process and is accompanied by economic growth urbanization and withdrawal of labor from the agricultural sector this paper provides a selective overview and synthesis of the issues involved in the commercialization and diversification process of agriculture drawing in significant part from the papers in this volume based on an assessment of the process observed in selected countries we show that the commercialization process should not be expected to be a frictionless process and significant equity and environmental consequences may occur at least in the short to medium term particularly when inappropriate policies are followed however we highlight that appropriate government policies including investment in rural infrastructure and crop improvement research and extension establishment of secure rights to land and water and development and liberalization of capital markets can help alleviate many of the possible adverse transitional consequences

conditional cash transfers and agricultural production lessons from the oportunidades experience in mexico abstract this paper explores whether cash transfer programmes conditioned on human capital outcomes can influence agricultural production programme impact on food consumption from own production land use livestock ownership and agricultural spending are evaluated using first difference and weighted estimators in which weights are constructed from propensity scores the programme is found to increase the value and variety of food consumed from own production and to increase land use livestock ownership and crop spending impact estimates are found to differ across land use categories and procampo participation results support the hypothesis that transfers influence agricultural production and impacts are greater for households invested in agriculture

political and institutional analysis of the successes and failures of china s wind power policy this paper identifies and explains how political and institutional factors have determined the relative successes and failures of china s wind power policy over the period 2005 2011 it finds that china has made significant progress in pursuing its wind power policy in terms of cumulative installed capacity wind turbine manufacturing industry development and wind turbine cost and argues that these achievements can be attributed to the political motives and institutional arrangements of the chinese government as well as to institutional changes on the other hand the paper finds that there are two prominent policy failures namely the low proportion of grid connected capacity and the rising trend of wind turbine incidents these have undermined the efficiency and effectiveness of china s wind power program the paper holds that the institutional sources for the first policy failure lies in the preference for setting wind power development targets in terms of installed capacity rather than generation and in coordination problems while the second policy failure lies in the lack of state technical codes for wind power integration and the unfair competition from the large state owned power companies the paper contributes to the academic literature on the political and institutional roles in china s wind power policy

linking smallholders to the new agricultural economy the case of the plataformas de concertacion in ecuador abstract this article examines the challenges of linking smallholders to high value food markets by looking at the experience of the plataformas programme in the ecuadorian sierra multiple evaluation methods are employed to ensure identification of program impact the findings suggest that the programme successfully improved the welfare of beneficiary farmers as measured by yields and gross margins these benefits are achieved through improving the efficiency of agricultural production and through selling at higher prices no significant secondary health or environmental effects were found overall the programme provides clear evidence that combining production support with facilitating market access can be successful

evaluating the interplays among economic growth and energy consumption and co2 emission of china during 1990 2007 the interplays among economy and energy and environment have been widely concerned this paper put forward several indicators to quantify the relationships among economic growth and energy consumption and co2 emission as an example these indicators were applied to evaluate the comprehensive performances of china during 1990 2007 the results show that chinese people has been living a better life with chinese rapid economic growth but not synchronously in urban and rural areas non carbon energy resources share has increased however fossil energy resources have still acted as the main driver for chinese economic growth during this period technical progress has improved the fossil energy efficiency of chinese economic activity which leads to co2 emission per unit gdp and co2 emission per capita unit gdp dropping simultaneously however the two indicators annual decline rates become smaller and smaller which reflects that technical progress role is dropping and economic scale s effect is climbing people s survival has a rising contribution to co2 emission co2 emission per capita has increased which shows that economic scale has greater impact on co2 emission than technical progress does relatively speaking chinese development patterns have become more and more sustainable during this period finally based on the related issues being discussed some corresponding suggestions are put forward for chinese government to further coordinate the relationship among economic development and energy consumption and co2 emission the proposed indicators can form a set of useful tool for policy makers to promote the harmonious development of economy and energy and environment in different regions and countries

company s affordability of increased energy costs due to climate policies a survey by sector in china this paper estimates the affordability of chinese companies on energy cost increases due to the introduction of market based climate policies the data were collected from 170 respondents mainly from iron and steel cement and chemical industries using a multiple bounded discrete choice mbdc format estimations indicate that a mean of 8 8 in energy cost increase would be acceptable for all the samples the chemical companies express a slightly higher affordability with the mean of acceptable ratios of energy cost increases being 9 9 while the cement companies show slightly lower affordability with a mean of 7 7 econometric analysis confirms that the market competition degree has a significant but negative relationship with the affordability while the company s size is significantly and positively associated with the affordability calculations indicate that the mean of affordable energy cost increases roughly equals a carbon price of 83 7 cny t co2 about 12 usd t co2 for chemical companies and around 40 cny t co2 about 6 usd t co2 for iron and steel and cement sectors this result provides a meaningful referendum for the development of carbon tax and the establishment of a domestic carbon emissions trading scheme in china especially from the perspective of surveyed industries

more politicians more corruption evidence from swedish municipalities in the literature on political economy and public choice it is typically assumed that government size correlates positively with public corruption the empirical literature however is inconclusive owing to both measurement problems and endogeneity this paper creates a corruption index based on original data from a survey covering top politicians and civil servants in all swedish municipalities the effect of more politicians on corruption problems is analyzed using discontinuities in the required minimum size of local councils despite the fact that sweden consistently has been ranked among the least corrupt countries in the world the survey suggest that non trivial corruption problems are present in sweden municipalities with more local council seats have more reported corruption problems and the regression discontinuity design suggests that the effect is causal

factors impacting diverging paths of renewable energy a review abstract considered an essential factor for countries development energy demand is growing worldwide unlike conventional sources the use of renewable energy sources has multiple benefits including increased energy security sustainable economic growth and pollution reduction in particular greenhouse gas emissions nevertheless there is a considerable difference in the share of renewable energy sources in national energy portfolios this study conducts a systematic literature review to identify drivers and barriers which could help understanding the diverging paths of renewable energy deployment for countries among a total of 1431 academic studies 60 qualitative and quantitative studies were identified using a multistage selection process designated manuscripts were explored in detail including publication years length of the studies countries represented and renewable energy sources referenced factors explaining countries renewable energy deployments were defined and organized into seven main categories economic environmental political regulatory social technical potential and technological within these categories economic considerations appeared most frequently across manuscripts while environmental factors were least represented these categories were then classified as drivers barriers or undetermined towards renewable energy deployment based on a one sample proportion statistical test economic environmental and social factors were found to be drivers whereas political regulatory technical potential and technological factors were not classified as either a driver or a barrier i e undetermined each main category contains several subcategories among which only national income was found to have a positive impact whereas all other subcategories were considered undetermined no significant barriers to the deployment of renewable energy sources were found over the analyzed period