Building Blocks: Investment in Renewable and Non-Renewable Technologies

Over the last several years, there has been a nation-wide intensification of policies directed at increasing the level of renewable sources of electricity.  These environmental policy changes have occurred against a backdrop of shifting economic regulation in power markets that has fundamentally redefined the mechanisms through which investors in power plants earn revenues. Rather than base payments upon costs, revenues in many regions are now based upon fluctuating energy prices and, in some cases, supplemental payments for installed capacity. This paper studies the interaction between these two major forces that are currently dominating the economic landscape of the electricity industry.  Using data from the western U.S., we examine how the large-scale expansion of intermittent resources of generation could influence long-run equilibrium prices and investment decisions under differing wholesale power market designs.  We find that as the level of wind penetration increases, the equilibrium investment mix of other resources shifts towards less baseload and more peaking capacity.  As wind penetration increases, an “average” wind producer earns increasingly more revenue under markets with capacity payments than those that base compensation on energy revenues.   Investment; Renewable Energy; Capacity Markets

Adverse Selection and Emissions Offsets

Programs where firms sell emissions ``offsets'' to reduce their emissions continue to provide important complementsto traditional environmental regulations. However in many cases, particularly with current and prospective climate change policy, they continue to be very�controversial. The problem of adverse selection lies at the heart of this controversy, as critics of�offset programs continue to produce evidence that these projects are paying firms for actions they�would have undertaken anyway, and are not producing ``additional'' reductions. This paper explores�the theoretical sources of non-additional offsets. �An important distinction arises between sales that indicate adverse selection and those that reveal information about aggregate emissions levels.��adverse selection; Emissions Markets; Offsets; Climate Policy

Enforcement of Vintage Differentiated Regulations: The Case of New Source Review

�This paper analyzes the effects of the New Source Review (NSR) environmental regulations on coal-fired electric power plants. �Regulations that grew out of the Clean Air Act of 1970 required new electric generating plants to install costly pollution control equipment but exempted existing plants with a grandfathering clause. �Existing plants lost their grandfathering status if they made ``major modifications'' to their plants. �We examine whether this caused firms to invest less in their old plants, possibly leading to lower efficiency and higher emissions. We find some evidence that the risk of NSR enforcement reduced capital expenditures at plants. However, we find no discernable effect on the operating costs, fuel efficiency or emissions of these plants.�New Source Review; Environmental Regulations; productivity; and Electricity

Allocation and Leakage in Regional Cap-And-Trade Markets for CO2

The allocation or assignment of emissions allowances is among the most contentious elements of the design of emissions trading systems. �Policy-makers usually try to satisfy a range of goals through the allocation process, including easing the transition costs for high-emissions firms, reducing leakage to unregulated regions, and mitigating the impact of the regulations on product prices such as electricity. �In this paper we develop a detailed representation of the US western electricity market to assess the potential impacts of various allocation proposals. �Several proposals involve the ``updating'' of allowance allocation, where the allocation is tied to the ongoing output of plants. �These allocation proposals are designed with the goals of limiting the pass-through of carbon costs to product prices, mitigating leakage, and of mitigating the costs to high-emissions firms. �However, �some forms of allocation updating can also inflate allowance prices, thereby limiting the benefits of such schemes to high emissions firms. � Thus, the anticipated benefits from allocation updating can be diluted and further distortions introduced into the trading system.electricity markets; Cap-and-Trade; Emissions Leakage

Enforcement of Vintage Differentiated Regulations: The Case of New Source Review

�This paper analyzes the effects of the New Source Review (NSR) environmentalregulations on coal-fired electric power plants. �Regulations that grew out of the Clean Air Act of 1970 required new electric generating plants to install costly pollution control equipment but exempted existing plants. �Existing plants lost their exemptions if they made ``major modifications.'' �We examine whether this caused firms to invest less in grandfathered plants, possibly leading to lower efficiency and higher emissions. We find �evidence that heightened NSR enforcement reduced capital expenditures at vulnerableplants. However, we find no discernable effect on other inputs or emissions.This paper analyzes the effects of the New Source Review (NSR) environmental�regulations on coal-fired electric power plants. �Regulations that grew out of the Clean Air Act of 1970 required new electric generating plants to install costly pollution control equipment but exempted existing plants. �Existing plants lost their exemptions if they made ``major modifications.'' �We examine whether this caused firms to invest less in grandfathered plants, possibly leading to lower efficiency and higher emissions. We find �evidence that heightened NSR enforcement reduced capital expenditures at vulnerable�plants. However, we find no discernable effect on other inputs or emissions.�New Source Review; Environmental Regulations; productivity; electricity

The Guy at the Controls: Labor Quality and Power Plant Efficiency

This paper examines the impact of individual human operators on the fuel efficiency of power plants. Although electricity generation is a fuel and capital intensive enterprise, anecdotal evidence, interviews, and empirical analysis support the hypothesis that labor, particularly power plant operators, can have a non-trivial impact on the operating efficiency of the plant. We present evidence to demonstrate these effects and survey the policies and practices of electricity producing firms that either reduce or exacerbate fuel efficiency differences across individual plant operators.

Local Solutions to Global Problems: Policy Choice and Regulatory Jurisdiction

This paper considers the efficiency of various types of environmental regulations when they are applied locally to pollutants whose damages extend outside the jurisdiction of the local regulator. We draw on examples from state- and city-level efforts to address climate change by enacting policies to reduce greenhouse gases. While previous work has noted the possibility for leakage, whereby the polluting sources move outside the jurisdiction of the regulation in order to escape it, we note an additional problem when policies are targeted downstream at consumers of goods whose production creates pollution. Specifically, we show how consumer-based policies can be circumvented by a simple reshuffling of who is buying from whom. We argue that the leakage and reshuffling problems are most pronounced with more flexible or market-based regulations. We conclude that localities may have the most effect on global pollutants when they enact efficiency standards or targeted subsidies.

Open oracles

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Boston Universit