The purpose of this study is to analyze the cost efficiency of electricity distribution systems in order to enable regulatory authorities to establish price- or revenue cap regulation regimes. The increasing use of efficiency analysis in the last decades has raised serious concerns among...

We examine a global refunding scheme for mitigating climate change. Countries pay an initial fee into a global fund that is invested in long-run assets. In each period, part of the fund is distributed among the participating countries in relation to the emission reductions they have achieved in...

There is widespread concern that an international agreement on stringent climate policies will not be reached because it would imply too high costs for fast growing economies like China. To quantify these costs we develop a general equilibrium model with fully endogenous growth. The framework...

To correct market failures due to the presence of negative externalities associated with energy consumption, governments have adopted a variety of policies, including taxes, subsidies, regulations and standards, and information-based policies. For example, labels that clearly convey energy...

This paper studies the voluntary provision of public goods that is partially driven by a desire to offset for individual polluting activities. We first extend existing theory and show that offsets allow a reduction in effective environmental pollution levels while not necessarily extending the...

The paper develops a two-region endogenous growth model with climate change affecting the countries' capital stocks negatively. We compare two different policies aimed at supporting less developed countries: climate mitigation by rich countries, which diminishes the increase in stock pollution...

Subglobal climate policies induce changes in international competitiveness and favor a relocation of carbon-emitting activities to non-abating regions. In this paper, we evaluate the potential for CO2 abatement and the emissions `leakage' effect in the copper industry, a prominent...

Computable general equilibrium models simulate the reaction of industries on carbon taxes. Their results differ strongly on the assumption of the underlying technologies. This paper compares two models and emphasizes the differences between their approaches to technology. The first model is the...

Firms subject to cost-of-service regulation cannot withhold windfall profits associated with free emissions allowances. This paper examines the efficiency and distributional impacts of two approaches to transfer free allowances to consumers: output subsidies and lump-sum payments. We employ an...

We study the effects of greenhouse gas emissions on optimum growth and environmental policy by using an expansion-in-varieties growth model with polluting non-renewable resources. Climate change harms the capital stock. Our main contribution is to introduce and extensively explore the naturally...