Latest posts
Why the European Emissions Trading Scheme needs reforming, and how this can be done
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Following the vote in the European Parliament, the Commission will not be able to quickly implement “backloading”, the point of which is to send a very short-term signal to the market pending further structural reforms. There still remain...
PJM Market: Good, Can Get Better
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The PJM market has always been, and continues to be, a source of fascination to anyone interested in organized or competitive wholesale electricity markets. First, it is by far the largest such organized market operating in North America, among the l...
Energy transition: ambiguity of the notion of variable geometry
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Since the Copenhagen conference of December 2009, the actors involved in climate negotiations seem be engaged in a game of mistigri, in which everyone is in a hurry to pass on any card that exposes them to the slightest commitment. The overall result...
The residential increasing block pricing structure: an efficient solution to control energy demand and tackle inequalities
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Increasing block tariffs structure -also called, progressive tariffs, tiered-rates or inverted block rates- is a pricing model that charges a higher rate per kWh at higher levels of energy usage, and a lower rate at lower usage levels. The model is b...
A blueprint for a European transmission system
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The European Commission’s proposal is supposed to deliver more cross-border electricity transmission.It is an extension of the current system of national-welfare centred regulations, a system which does not target the optimisation of the EU ele...
Cost Benefit Analysis in the context of the Energy Infrastructure Package
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Cost Benefit Analysis has proven to be a useful tool to support the economic appraisal of important projects in many sectors. Recently, a single Cost Benefit Analysis method has been proposed at EU level to evaluate and compare electricity transmissi...
Has the EU ETS induced low-carbon innovation?
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The EU ETS is the main instrument of European climate policy, and many policymakers envisage it as a driving force of the EU’s transition to a low-carbon economy. By putting a price on emissions, the scheme is expected to encourage heavy pollut...
FERC Survey: Millions Of Smart Meters, Only A Handful Smart Tariffs
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The Energy Policy Act of 2005 requires FERC to publish an annual account of advancements in smart metering and demand response programs in the US, the latest of which was published in Dec 2012. It is a comprehensive survey of 3,349 “entities,&r...
Revisiting the cost escalation curse of nuclear power: New lessons from the French experience
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Since the first wave of nuclear reactors in 1970 to the on-going construction of Generation III+ reactors in Finland and France, nuclear power seems to be doomed to a cost escalation curse. If the curse is not stopped, nuclear power competitiveness w...
Progressive energy tariffs in France: an inefficient and unfair response to fuel poverty and energy efficiency goals
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The French Lower House passed a law last October introducing progressive tariffs for all energies distributed through a network: natural gas, electricity and heat. Though it was rejected by the Senate, the government is still supporting it. Introduci...
Texas Avoids Capacity Market While France Succumbs
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Few would argue with the claim that Texas has the best wholesale and the most competitive retail electricity market in the US, if not the world. But it suffers from an ailment called inadequate resource adequacy. Private investors, who are the key st...
Decarbonisation is no 100 metre race
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This week, the European Climate Commissioner made a proposal to stabilise the European Union’s emission trading system – a market for greenhouse gas emission allowances that has been in place since 2005. Under the proposal, allowances worth s...
Coal Losing Ground To Cheap Gas
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With the November’s election around the corner, everything in Washington and beyond is viewed from the highly polarized and politicized perspective with both parties trying to milk the issues for all they can. The recent demise of coal is no except...
Oil and the dead cat bounce
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What crisis? Nymex and ICE oil price movement shows how oil prices can be moved anywhere as long as its up, except of course when its down, where fundamentals point with stubborn determination.Recent weeks, especially the last show that sometimes the...
EU Harmonisation of Capacity Adequacy Policies: Free trade of capacity rights is not a relevant issue.
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Harmonisation in matter of capacity adequacy is not on the 2014 agenda of electricity markets integration. But the Council of European Energy Regulators (CEER), the European Commission and different European bodies of stakeholders have engaged reflec...
A sustainable framework for biofuels in the European Union
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Biofuels are a key component of the EU strategy to improve the efficiency in transport, one of the sectors with a larger energy use and carbon emissions in Europe, and for which the European Commission has set very ambitious reduction objectives Howe...
Market coupling does not lower prices!
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Market coupling is one of the key-policies for achieving the EU single electricity market. The EU Commission praises the price-lowering effects of market integration in the first draft of the Internal Market Communication of August 30th: “wholesale...
Energy Demand Growth Is Passé
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While politicians are trying to figure out how to get the economy growing again, a growing number of energy efficiency experts are working equally hard to bring energy demand growth to a permanent halt. We are, of course, not talking about the develo...
When is it abusive for a network operator to restrict exports?
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Restricting international trade between Sweden and Denmark – that is the abuse the Swedish network operator Svenska Kraftnät was accused of by the European Commission. By limiting energy exports to Denmark, Svenska Kraftnät relieved internal...
How to refurbish all buildings by 2050
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Buildings account for 40% of the total energy consumption of the EU and they are one of the most significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions (36% of the EU total). In order to achieve the 2050 EU building sector target, the energy performance of...
