Technological innovation can lower the cost of achieving environmental objectives, so it is important to understand how environmental policy design and technological innovation are linked. This is particularly true in the area of climate change where the estimated future costs of reducing...

Responding to a Gleneagles G8 Summit request, this book shows how changes in energy efficiency, economic structure, income, prices and fuel mix have affected recent trends in energy use and CO2 emissions in IEA countries. The results are a “wake-up call” for us all. Since 1990, the rate of...

Electric power in OECD countries is mostly produced by large central generating stations, then transmitted along high voltage lines to local distribution systems that carry it to final consumers. Distributed generation plants are different. They produce power on an electricity consumer’s own...

For the first time, the IEA has reviewed the energy policies of the European Union which shape the energy use of almost 500 million citizens in 27 EU member countries. A unique entity governed under complex and almost constantly evolving structures, the EU constitutes a challenge for energy...

In October 2014, the European Union (EU) set ambitious climate and energy targets for 2030, confirming its global leadership on climate change. But while the targets are in place, the legal framework to implement them is yet to be developed. Energy Policies of IEA Countries: European Union –...

This paper takes stock of one year of policy responses to the 2022/2023 energy crisis triggered by Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine from the perspective of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). In this paper, "SME policy responses" are defined as all government policies, whether...

This book examines the major rural developments and the issues that policy makers have been dealing with across the OECD over the last two decades. The OECD Conference, held in Siena, Italy, in July 2002, on the Future of Rural Policy, identified the need for rural policies to look beyond...

This note examines which regional economies in Europe are most exposed to rising gas prices on the basis of their dependency on gas intensive manufacturing sectors such as chemicals or basic metals. Based on OECD calculations we find that the employment shares of the most gas-intensive...