In Germany, substantial drops in wholesale power prices have become a regular phenomenon. While such price drops have far-reaching implications for the functioning of the power market, their underlying determinants remain poorly understood. To fill this gap, we propose a Markov regime-switching...

What happens to the merit order of electricity markets when all electricity is supplied by intermittent renewable energy sources coupled with large-scale electricity storage? With near-zero marginal cost of production, will there still be a role for an energy-only electricity market? We answer...

We derive optimal subsidization of renewable energies in electricity markets. The analysis takes into account that capacity investment must be chosen under uncertainty about demand conditions and capacity availability, and that capacity as well as electricity generation may be sources of...

In many countries, the transition process towards a low-carbon economy has been associated with increasing electricity prices. Microeconometric evaluations of the causal impact of electricity price changes on plant-level outcomes are rare, though. By exploiting local randomization induced by...

The EU-wide Emission Trading Scheme (ETS), established in 2005, is a key pillar of Europe¿s strategy to attain compliance with the Kyoto Protocol. Under this scheme, CO2 allowances have thus far been allocated largely free of charge. This paper demonstrates that such cost-free allocation,...

We derive optimal subsidization of renewable energies in electricity markets. The analysis takes into account that capacity investment must be chosen under uncertainty about demand conditions and capacity availability, and that capacity as well as electricity generation may be sources of...

The EU-wide Emission Trading Scheme (ETS), established in 2005, is a key pillar of Europe’s strategy to attain compliance with the Kyoto Protocol. Under this scheme, CO2 allowances have thus far been allocated largely free of charge. This paper demonstrates that such cost-free allocation,...

Energy-efficient biomass cookstoves (EEBC) are an important technology for the three billion people relying on firewood and charcoal for cooking in the Global South. This paper assesses the price-responsiveness of demand for EEBC and the role of information about health and economic benefits....

Since September 2009, Regulation 244/2009 of the European Commission enforces the gradual phase-out of incandescent light bulbs. As of September 2012, only energyefficient lighting sources will be allowed for sale. Among these are halogen light bulbs, light-emitting diodes (LED), or compact...

Rebound effects measure the behaviorally induced offset in the reduction of energy consumption following efficiency improvements. Using both panel estimation and quantile-regression methods on household travel diary data collected in Germany between 1997 and 2009, this study investigates the...