Research and development towards green technologies under technical and policy uncertainty: A real options approach to investments

Green technological progress bears a strong potential to alleviate climate change, but its utilization is contingent on factors which are by nature impossible to anticipate or predict. Developing stochastic optimisation models, we explore how the decision to invest in research and development towards greener technologies is influenced by environmental policies in a world of technical and policy uncertainty. The models are applied to offshore wind park investments and investments into energy-saving technologies. Policies studied are e.g. energy taxes and quotas as well as research subsidies.Grüner technologischer Wandel hat viel Potential, den Klimawandel zu mildern. Das Ausschöpfen dieses Potentials hängt jedoch von schwer abschätzbaren Faktoren ab. Mit Hilfe von stochastischen Optimierungsmodellen wird untersucht, wie die Entscheidung beflügelt werden kann, in die Entwicklung grüner Technologien zu investieren, auch wenn die Unsicherheit über technischen Fortschritt und politischen Rahmenbedingungen groß ist. Diskutierte Anwendungsbeispiele sind Investitionen in Meereswindparks oder Energiespartechnologien. Analysiert werden z. B. Energiesteuern und Forschungssubventionen

The implications of initiating immediate climate change mitigation - A potential for co-benefits?

Fragmented climate policies across parties of the United Nations Framework on Climate Change have led to the question of whether initiating significant and immediate climate change mitigation can support the achievement of other non-climate objectives. We analyze such potential co-benefits in connection with a range of mitigation efforts using results from eleven integrated assessment models. These model results suggest that an immediate mitigation of climate change coincide for Europe with an increase in energy security and a higher utilization of non-biomass renewable energy technologies. In addition, the importance of phasing out coal is highlighted with external cost estimates showing substantial health benefits consistent with the range of mitigation efforts

Assessing the Impact of Renewable Energy on Regional Sustainability—A Comparative Study of Sogn og Fjordane (Norway) and Okinawa (Japan)

The drive to expand renewable energies is often in direct conflict with sustainable development goals. Thus, it is important that energy policies account for potential trade-offs. We assess the interlinkages between energy, food, water and land, for two case studies, Okinawa and Sogn og Fjordane. We apply a range of assessment methods and study their usefulness as tools to identify trade-offs and to compare the sustainability performance. We calculate cross-sectoral footprints, self-sufficiency ratios and perform a simplified Energy-Water-Food nexus analysis. We use the latter for assessing scenarios to increase energy and food self-sufficiency in Okinawa, while we use ecosystem service (ESS) accounting for Sogn og Fjordane. For Okinawa, we find that constraints on the energy, food and water sectors urgently call for integrated approaches to energy policy; for Sogn og Fjordane, the further expansion of renewables comes at the expense of cultural and supporting ESS, which could outweigh gains from increased energy exports. We recommend a general upgrade to indicators and visualization methods that look beyond averages and a fostering of infrastructure for data on sustainable development based on harmonized international protocols. We warn against rankings of countries or regions based on benchmarks that are neither theory-driven nor location-specific

Carbon leakage in a fragmented climate regime: The dynamic response of global energy markets

As a global climate agreement has not yet been achieved, a variety of national climate policy agendas are being pursued in different parts of the world. Regionally fragmented climate policy regimes are prone to carbon leakage between regions, which has given rise to concerns about the environmental effectiveness of this approach. This study investigates carbon leakage through energy markets and the resulting macro-economic effects by exploring the sensitivity of leakage to the size and composition of pioneering regions that adopt ambitious climate action early on. The study uses the multi-regional energy–economy–climate model REMIND 1.5 to analyze the implications of Europe, China and the United States taking unilateral or joint early action. We find that carbon leakage is the combined effect of fossil fuel and capital market re-allocation. Leakage is limited to 15% of the emission reductions in the pioneering regions, and depends on the size and composition of the pioneering coalition and the decarbonization strategy in the energy sector. There is an incentive to delay action to avoid near-term costs, but the immediate GDP losses after acceding to a global climate regime can be higher in the case of delayed action compared to early action. We conclude that carbon leakage is not a strong counter-argument against early action by pioneers to induce other regions to adopt more stringent mitigation

Informe de suficiencia profesional ejecutado en el programa nacional de asistencia alimentaria - PIN (periodo 2008 - 2011)

El presente trabajo consiste en la sistematización de la experiencia profesional ejecutada en el programa nacional de asistencia alimentaria – PRONAA, en el cual se desarrolló el programa integral de nutrición (PIN) - sub programa pre escolar durante los años 2008 – 2011. El objetivo es: compartir las experiencias del ejercicio profesional relacionadas con la gestión del pin en un ámbito de diez provincias de atención de la región Cajamarca y una de la región de la libertad. Se obtuvo como resultados: la articulación del programa integral de nutrición - pin con la producción agraria local. Atendiéndose con alimentos en el período 2008 – 2011 a un promedio de 33,108 niños de 3 a 5 años de edad en 1,384 instituciones educativas del nivel inicial y programas no escolarizados del nivel inicial (PRONOEIS), ubicados en el 1, 2 quintil de pobreza y en el 3 quintil considerando bolsones de desnutrición crónica y asistencia escolar. La utilización de una metodología basada en el respeto a su cultura y ciudadanía, permitió un progresivo empoderamiento de docentes, padres de familia y autoridades para una vigilancia asertiva y en equipo del programa social, evidenciado en el cambio de prácticas de nutrición, normas de higiene y manipulación de alimentos.Tesi

Collective Action and Social Innovation in the Energy Sector: A Mobilization Model Perspective

This conceptual paper applies a mobilization model to Collective Action Initiatives (CAIs) in the energy sector. The goal is to synthesize aspects of sustainable transition theories with social movement theory to gain insights into how CAIs mobilize to bring about niche-regime change in the context of the sustainable energy transition. First, we demonstrate how energy communities, as a representation of CAIs, relate to social innovation. We then discuss how CAIs in the energy sector are understood within both sustainability transition theory and institutional dynamics theory. While these theories are adept at describing the role energy CAIs have in the energy transition, they do not yet offer much insight concerning the underlying social dimensions for the formation and upscaling of energy CAIs. Therefore, we adapt and apply a mobilization model to gain insight into the dimensions of mobilization and upscaling of CAIs in the energy sector. By doing so we show that the expanding role of CAIs in the energy sector is a function of their power acquisition through mobilization processes. We conclude with a look at future opportunities and challenges of CAIs in the energy transition.This research was conducted under the COMETS (Collective action Models for Energy Transition and Social Innovation) project, funded by the Horizon 2020 Framework Program of the European Commission, grant number 837722

Collective action and social innovation in the energy sector: a mobilization model perspective

This conceptual paper applies a mobilization model to Collective Action Initiatives (CAIs) in the energy sector. The goal is to synthesize aspects of sustainable transition theories with social movement theory to gain insights into how CAIs mobilize to bring about niche-regime change in the context of the sustainable energy transition