Green certificate trading

Policies to promote renewable electricity are increasingly seen as a way to reduce the negative environmental impacts associated with electricity consumption and meet growing electricity demand. This paper reviews the international experience with one such policy, namely, renewable energy certificates, and considers important design aspects of a national green certificate system. Within a South African context, a green certificate system would provide a mechanism with which to verify compliance with any future renewable energy obligations, and would encourage renewable electricity generation in the current monopoly environment. In terms of a national green certificate framework, international experience has shown that renewable energy certificates must be both accredited and standardized, with enforcement of penalties for non-compliance with renewable energy quotas. Above all, a long-term and stable policy environment is crucial for developing renewable energy markets.

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Assessment of Renewable Electricity Policy for Sustainable Electricity Generation in Nigeria

10.21203/rs.3.rs-1046396/v1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

OLANRELE IYABO

Keyword(s):

Renewable Energy ◽

Electricity Generation ◽

Fossil Fuel ◽

Renewable Electricity ◽

Political Will ◽

Energy Efficiency Policy ◽

Renewable Electricity Generation ◽

Integration Of Renewables ◽

Sustainable Electricity

Abstract Nigeria commits to fast track the integration of renewables in electricity generation by enacting a 2015 National Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Policy (NREEEP). Thus, this policy briefing assesses the effect of the policy, and other socioeconomic factors, on the deployment of renewable electricity generation. The preliminary findings show that renewable energy policy has little effect in facilitating renewable electricity integration in Nigeria due to lack of political will and its adverse effect evident in the non-implementation of incentives like feed-in-tariffs and a zero import duty waiver. Second, increased fossil fuel consumption impedes the deployment of renewable electricity due to the hydrocarbon endowment and its subsidization. The domestic financial market development in Nigeria does not also support the deployment of renewable electricity that requires long-term finance. It requires a political will to strengthen the legal and institutional framework for a sustainable electricity generation deployment. It is also pertinent to consider the total removal of fossil fuel subsidies for renewable electricity integration.

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Foreign Direct Investments, Renewable Electricity Output, and Ecological Footprints: Do Financial Globalization Facilitate Renewable Energy Transition and Environmental Welfare in Bangladesh?

Asia-Pacific Financial Markets ◽

10.1007/s10690-021-09335-7 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Muntasir Murshed ◽

Mohamed Elheddad ◽

Rizwan Ahmed ◽

Mohga Bassim ◽

Ei Thuzar Than

Keyword(s):

Renewable Energy ◽

Environmental Sustainability ◽

Electricity Generation ◽

Energy Transition ◽

Well Being ◽

Financial Globalization ◽

Renewable Electricity ◽

Fdi Inflows ◽

Ecological Footprints ◽

Renewable Electricity Generation

AbstractPhasing out fossil fuel dependency to adopt renewable energy technologies is pertinent for both ensuring energy security and for safeguarding the well-being of the environment. However, financial constraints often restrict the developing countries, in particular, from undergoing the renewable energy transition that is necessary for easing the environmental hardships. Against this background, this study makes a novel attempt to evaluate the impacts of FDI inflows on enhancing renewable energy use and attaining environmental sustainability in Bangladesh between 1972 and 2015. Using the autoregressive distributed lags with structural break approach to estimate the short- and long-run elasticities, it is found that FDI inflows enhance the share of renewable electricity output in the total electricity output levels of the country. Besides, FDI inflows are also evidenced to directly hamper environmental quality by boosting the ecological footprints figures of Bangladesh. Hence, it can be said that FDI promotes renewable electricity generation in Bangladesh but transforms the nation into a pollution haven. However, although FDI inflows cannot directly reduce the ecological footprints, a joint ecological footprint mitigation impact of FDI inflows and renewable electricity generation is evidenced. Besides, the findings also verify the authenticity of the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis in Bangladesh’s context. Therefore, economic growth can be referred to as being both the cause and the panacea to the environmental problems faced by Bangladesh. These results, in a nutshell, calls for effective measures to be undertaken for attracting the relatively cleaner FDI in Bangladesh whereby the objectives of renewable energy transition and environmental sustainability can be achieved in tandem. In line with these findings, several appropriate financial globalization policies are recommended.

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Determinants of Electricity Consumption and Volatility-Driven Innovative Roadmaps to One Hundred Percent Renewables for Top Consuming Nations in Africa

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13116239 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (11) ◽

pp. 6239

Author(s):

Mark Agyei-Sakyi ◽

Yunfei Shao ◽

Oppong Amos ◽

Armah Marymargaret

Keyword(s):

South Africa ◽

Electric Power ◽

Causal Relationship ◽

Electricity Generation ◽

Electricity Consumption ◽

Electric Power System ◽

Cointegration Analysis ◽

Renewable Electricity ◽

African Countries ◽

Renewable Electricity Generation

The determinants of providing affordable electricity for all in top energy-consuming African countries vary and are in line with the percentage of the current population with access to electricity and volatility in a country’s electric power system, but there is rare evidence of such research. This study categorizes Egypt–Algeria as a panel of countries with 100% access to electricity, and Nigeria–South Africa as otherwise, to investigate the causal relationship between domestic electricity demand, renewable electricity generation, population, and GDP. The study proposed and implemented a novel machine learning model for viable and volatility-driven pathways for renewable electric power transition up to 2030. Results from Pedroni cointegration analysis suggest no evidence of long-run relationships among the variables. Nonetheless, there exists a short-run unidirectional causal relationship from GDP to electricity consumption for Nigeria–South Africa; all except Egypt can achieve 100% access to green electricity. The implication is that, through radical renewable electricity generation innovations, countries can achieve renewable-dominated electric power systems despite expected disruptions from the coronavirus pandemic. For sustainable energy planning, countries aiming to achieve 100% renewables is possible due to the radical transition pathways since it takes into account the volatility.

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Evaluation of H.R. 2454’s Potential Impacts on Texas’s Electricity Profile Using the Rosenfeld Effect as a Basis for Evaluation

ASME 2010 4th International Conference on Energy Sustainability, Volume 1 ◽

10.1115/es2010-90130 ◽

2010 ◽

Author(s):

Melissa C. Lott ◽

Michael E. Webber

Keyword(s):

Energy Efficiency ◽

Electricity Generation ◽

Electricity Consumption ◽

Clean Energy ◽

Renewable Electricity ◽

Efficiency Measures ◽

Technological Advances ◽

Federal Standard ◽

Renewable Electricity Generation ◽

And Shifts

The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (H.R. 2454) introduces a combined federal standard for efficiency and renewable electricity. This standard requires utilities to supply a portion of their customer’s demand using energy efficiency measures and renewable electricity generation. (1) This manuscript discusses an analysis conducted on the effect of H.R. 2454 on Texas’s electricity generation mix. In order to benchmark the net opportunity for energy efficiency, this analysis includes the historical trends in electricity consumption by sector and per capita for two states, Texas and California. This manuscript contains discussion on findings in two key areas. First, the overall consumption patterns seen historically in Texas compared to California including key differences found in each sector: residential, industrial and commercial/other. Second, the factors that contributed to these patterns including policy mechanisms, technological advances, and shifts in industry that contributed to these patterns. These findings are then applied to electricity consumption and generation mix projections in Texas. Evaluating these projections reveals the potential environmental impacts of H.R. 2454 on Texas.

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Do Environment-Related Policy Instruments and Technologies Facilitate Renewable Energy Generation? Exploring the Contextual Evidence from Developed Economies

Energies ◽

10.3390/en14030690 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 14 (3) ◽

pp. 690 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Umer Shahzad ◽

Magdalena Radulescu ◽

Syed Rahim ◽

Cem Isik ◽

Zahid Yousaf ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sustainable Development ◽

Renewable Energy ◽

Electricity Generation ◽

Developing Economies ◽

Energy Generation ◽

Environmental Taxes ◽

Renewable Electricity ◽

Developed Economies ◽

Renewable Electricity Generation ◽

Renewable Energy Generation

Attaining sustainable development and cleaner production is a major challenge both for developed and developing economies; income, institutional regulations, institutional quality and international trade are the key determinants of environmental externalities. The current work attempts to study the role of environmental taxes and regulations on renewable energy generation for developed economies. For that, the authors have used the annual dataset for the period 1994 to 2018. More specifically, the study investigates the impacts of environmental taxes, environment-related technologies and the environmental policy stringency index on renewable electricity generation in 29 developed countries. Given the short available data of these countries, the authors have developed panel cointegration and panel regressions models (fully modified ordinary least square (FMOLS), quantile regressions). The heterogeneous panel empirics stated that environmental regulations and income level support renewable electricity generation. The conclusions further mention that bureaucratic qualities such as decision making and trade openness tend to reduce renewable energy generation. The empirical findings allowed us to draw new narrative and implications. Overall, the conclusions argue that innovative regulations and policies can be useful for attaining specific sustainable development goals (e.g., SDG-7: cleaner and cheap energy).

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Trust is Good, Control is Better: A Review on Monitoring and Characterization Techniques for Flow Battery Electrolytes

Materials Horizons ◽

10.1039/d0mh01632b ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Ulrich Sigmar Schubert ◽

Oliver Nolte ◽

Ivan Volodin ◽

Christian Stolze ◽

Martin D. Hager

Keyword(s):

Energy Storage ◽

Electricity Generation ◽

Large Scale ◽

Good Control ◽

Renewable Electricity ◽

Flow Battery ◽

Large Share ◽

Characterization Techniques ◽

Renewable Electricity Generation ◽

Storage Technologies

Flow Batteries (FBs) currently are one of the most promising large-scale energy storage technologies for energy grids with a large share of renewable electricity generation. Among the main technological challenges...

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Procurement, finance and the energy transition: Between global processes and territorial realities

Environment and Planning E Nature and Space ◽

10.1177/2514848621991121 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 251484862199112

Author(s):

Lucy Baker

Keyword(s):

Electricity Generation ◽

Local Level ◽

Energy Transition ◽

Community Empowerment ◽

Renewable Electricity ◽

Middle Income ◽

Middle Income Countries ◽

Asset Class ◽

Renewable Electricity Generation ◽

Utility Scale

Utility-scale renewable electricity generation is essential to decarbonisation as well as to ensuring affordable and secure electricity supplies around the world. Yet thus far there has been limited critical thinking dedicated to the complexities behind the finance and ownership of this new infrastructure and how national and local stakeholders should participate in and benefit from its development, particularly in contexts of high inequality in low- and middle-income countries. As the global renewable energy industry becomes increasingly consolidated and financialised, evidence from a number of countries suggests that despite the pro-environmental outcomes of utility-scale renewable electricity generation, the processes and institutions that procure and finance it have often failed to include or benefit individuals and communities living in the national and local vicinity. This paper therefore sets two key competing objectives of renewable electricity generation in context: as a predictable, long-term revenue stream for investors, and as a mechanism for socio-economic development and community empowerment. Building on scholarship from human geography, development studies and sustainability transitions, my analysis takes forward understandings of the role of finance in utility-scale renewable electricity generation as a key aspect of the political economy of the energy transition. In exploring the evolution of renewable electricity as a new and rapidly emerging asset class I consider how its development is increasingly determined by the frameworks and logics of finance and investment. Drawing on examples from South Africa and Mexico, I address the following questions: What are the evolving configurations and processes of finance and investment in utility-scale renewable electricity generation? How have they been facilitated? And what tensions have arisen from their implementation at the national and local level?

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