This paper applies the concept of damage coefficients introduced in Houba and Kremers (2008) to provide an estimate of the cost of climate change - in particular the cost of changes in mean regional temperature and precipitation - to the fruit vegetation sector. We concentrate on the production...

The energy efficiency of the residential housing stock plays a key role in strategies to mitigate climate change and global warming. In this context, it is frequently argued that private investment and the quality of thermal upgrades is too low in the light of the challenges faced and the...

We consider a linear city model where both firms and consumers have to incur transport costs. Following a standard Hotelling (1929) type framework we analyze a duopoly where firms facing a continuum of consumers choose locations and prices, with the transportation rate being linear in distance....

We study the performance of different regulatory approaches for the expansion of electricity transmission networks in the light of realistic demand patterns and fluctuating wind power. In particular, we are interested in the relative performance of a combined merchant-regulatory mechanism...

Coal continues to be an important fuel in many countries' energy mix and, despite the climate change concerns, it is likely to maintain this position for the next decades. In this paper a numerical model is developed to investigate the evolution of the international market for steam coal, the...

National science and technology (S&T) systems are often mentioned as a condition for competitiveness of high technology sectors. Therefore, public S&T policies should actively support the development of national S&T systems. In particular in Eastern Europe an active S&T policy is often demanded...

We examine the impact of bank competition and institutional factors on net firm entry in a sample of European manufacturing industries over the 1995-2006 period. Taking into account industry differences in the need for external finance, we find that bank competition helps firm entry. In...

We revisit key elements of European power market design with respect to both short term operation and longer-term investment and re-investment choices. For short term markets, the European policy debate focuses on the definition of common interfaces, like for example gate closure time. We argue...

This paper studies the interaction of information disclosure and reputational concerns in certification markets. We argue that by revealing less precise information a certifier reduces the threat of capture. Opaque disclosure rules may reduce profits but also constrain feasible bribes. For large...