Heating demand accounts for a large fraction of the overall energy demand of private households in Germany. A better understanding of the adoption and diffusion of energy-efficient and renewables-based residential heating systems (RHS) is of high policy relevance, particularly against the...

This paper investigates key drivers and barriers behind homeowners’ decisions to switch from a fossil fuel (i.e. oil or gas boiler) to a renewable residential heating system (RHS). For this purpose, we draw on data from a 2010 questionnaire survey among owners of existing 1-family or 2-family...

Biorefineries, especially if based on woody biomass, may cause significant changes to the forest and wood-based industry. The resulting changes may, in turn, affect the economic feasibility of lignocellulosic biofuels production. In this article, we introduce a spatial partial equilibrium model...

In this paper we compare development trends, economics and financial risks of alternative large-scale solar power generation technologies (parabolic trough, solar tower, and three different photovoltaic technologies). In particular, a number of European countries, Algeria and the US promote...

In this paper we analyze how development of the economics related to CCS technology in coal-fired power plants affects market diffusion. Specifically, we (1) show the (significant) variance in economic expectations for commercial-grade CCS hard coal power plants observed in selected recent...

In a perfectly competitive market with a possibility of technological innovation we contrast guaranteed feed-in tariffs for electricity from renewables and tradable green certificates from a dynamic efficiency and social welfare point of view. Specifically, we model decisions about the...

The search for economically efficient policy instruments designed to promote the diffusion of renewable energy technologies in liberalized markets has led to the introduction of quota-based tradable 'green' certificate (TGC) schemes for renewable electricity. However, there is a debate about the...

This paper investigates the impact of ICT- and non-ICT capital, and of labour at different skill levels, on productivity and employment in the financial intermediation sector of twelve EU member countries plus the US and Japan. A stochastic possibility frontiers (SPF) approach is applied to...

In this paper we empirically analyse the impact of disaggregated ICT capital on the electricity intensity in five major European industries (chemical, food, metal, pulp & paper and textile). The analysis of each industrial sector is based on an unbalanced panel including data for eight EU member...

In this paper, we investigate existing and possible future power generation capacities in Switzerland from a risk-return perspective, using the Mean-Variance Portfolio Theory of Markowitz (1952). The study covers power generation technologies currently in operation, such as nuclear power,...