Since early 2009, electricity and gas distribution in Germany has been subject to incentive regulation designed to ensure greater efficiency in electricity and gas grid operation. However, it remains to be seen how changes to the regulatory framework will affect the investment behavior of...

Since early 2009, power supply in Germany has been subject to incentive regulation designed to ensure greater efficiency in electricity and gas grid operation. However, it remains to be seen how changes to the regulatory framework will affect the investment behavior of distribution system...

This paper applies parametric and non-parametric and parametric tests to assess the efficiency of electricity distribution companies in Germany. We address traditional issues in electricity sector benchmarking, such as the role of scale effects and optimal utility size, as well as new evidence...

While the link between the ownership and productive efficiency of firms has been discussed extensively, no consensus exists regarding the superiority of one or the other in non-competitive, regulated environments. This paper applies a flexible production model to test for efficiency differences...

This paper examines firm-level productivity for German electricity retailers using a structural production function approach. The sector was subject to fundamental changes in market structure after retail liberalization in 1998. Competition was supposed to increase productivity and reduce retail...

In this paper we analyze the investment behavior of electricity distribution companies. First, we test the hypothesis if the implementation of an incentive-based regulatory scheme with revenue caps impacts the firms' investment decisions in general. Second, we test if the specific regulatory...

We analyze the effects of an incentive based regulatory scheme with revenue caps on the investment behaviors and decisions of 109 electricity distribution companies operating in Germany in 2006-2012. We hypothesize that Germany's implementation of incentive regulation in 2009 has a negative...

In this paper we present an international cross-country benchmarking analysis for utility regulation of France and Germany, the two largest electricity distribution countries in Europe. We examine the relative performance of 99 French and 77 German distribution companies operating within two...

In January 2009 Germany introduced incentive regulation for the electricity distribution sector based on results obtained from econometric and nonparametric benchmarking analysis. One main problem for the regulator in assigning the relative efficiency scores are unobserved firm-specific factors...

This paper, which is one of the first to estimate productivity in retail electricity for a European country after liberalisation, analyses the effect of ownership and governance structure by using a unique dataset of German electricity retailers from 2003 to 2012. An innovative service...