Utilities Policy最新文献

China's residential tiered electricity pricing has been implemented for over a decade without a timely update. Past researches reveal the significant energy-saving effect of public policy cognition. This paper traces the relationship leveraging data from two surveys conducted in 2019 and 2023. We find that residents with some policy knowledge rose by one-third. However, policy cognition does not appear to lead to usage reductions. One crucial explanation is that changes in payment modes lower the salience of electricity bills, resulting in pronounced price misperceptions. This paper documents the role of adequate information feedback in enhancing the nonlinear tariff effect.

An increasing block tariff (IBT) policy for residential natural gas has been implemented in all Chinese cities with gas supply since January 2016 to guide residents to reduce gas. Due to the different local climate and demographic characteristics of China's regions, the IBT is not uniform, which provides an opportunity to evaluate the energy-saving effect of IBTs. This paper takes Hefei City as an example, based on a bimonthly bill dataset of Hefei residents from January 2014 to October 2018 and a difference-in-difference (DID) experiment designed within a regression discontinuity design (RDD) framework. The results show that the current IBT has a significant energy-saving effect, especially for households falling within the third price block, but not for households near the price-block thresholds. Further heterogeneity analyses show higher treatment effects for wall-mounted boiler heating users than non-wall-mounted boiler heating users and during the heating season than the non-heating season. These results suggest that the government should optimize the IBT from three to four blocks and develop separate rates for different users and seasons.

We examine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on electricity consumption in seven U.S. cities. A high-level analysis reveals that reductions in electricity consumption were mostly short-term, mainly when lockdowns were first introduced. Bayesian structural time series modeling was used to decompose electricity consumption into multiple tailored components to better understand the pandemic's impact. We find that models incorporating population mobility achieved high accuracy rates using pre-pandemic data and even better rates using post-pandemic data. Electricity usage dropped during the first six weeks of the pandemic in all but one of the cities studied.

The United Kingdom is among the countries experiencing a cost-of-living crisis believed to be influenced, at least in part, by the dynamics of the international oil and gas markets. To this end, this study aims to achieve to achieve two objectives. Firstly, the dynamic association between the UK's inflation and oil and gas prices is examined. Further, the study examines whether the response of the UK's inflation to energy price dynamics is (a)symmetric. This study adopts wavelet coherency to determine the dynamic co-movement between energy prices and inflation. In addition, the dynamic simulated autoregressive distributed lag model (DS-ARDL) is used to examine the dynamic response of inflation to energy price changes. The estimation results reveal a symmetric response of inflation to gas price shocks. Further, the response of inflation to oil price shocks is asymmetric. Interestingly, the effect of gas price dynamics passes more strongly to inflation than to oil price dynamics. These findings suggest that a more diversified energy mix could help prevent substantial energy price pass-through to inflationary pressures.

This paper focuses on evaluating and benchmarking the governance of regulatory agencies in Brazil's water and sanitation sector. Using a unique database obtained through the application of a questionnaire, we developed an index of regulatory governance and ranked all the agencies in Brazil that participated in the study. The index is an aggregate number of the evaluation of four key governance characteristics: Autonomy, Transparency, Accountability, and Tools & Capacity, including not only formal aspects of regulation but also indicators related to actual implementation. Based on 18 different indices, we analyze the positions of agencies with regard to different aspects of their regulatory governance, considering not only performance in each variable but also scores in the different components of each category. This evaluation identifies particular agency shortcomings regarding governance and indicates needed improvements. Although Brazil has strived to consolidate the governance design of its regulatory agencies, implementing the independent regulator model still faces several challenges. Various aspects of governance can be improved to pursue greater efficiency and quality in providing services, particularly in Accountability and Political Autonomy, where the country shows the largest number of regulatory agencies with the lowest scores. Conversely, almost half of the participating agencies show optimal scores in the Regulatory Autonomy aspect of governance. The results, for the most part, corroborate the institutional theory, in which the role of institutions is paramount for greater efficiency in providing public services, as it reduces information asymmetries and transaction costs and maximizes economic incentives.

This study utilizes a state-level approach to explore the economic implications of decarbonizing Mexico's electricity grid. By modeling the costs of four power generation mix scenarios for 2060, the research highlights the diverse renewable energy potentials and current power generation mixes across Mexican states. While transitions to natural gas or nuclear power emerge as the most economically attractive options, the study underscores the environmental and political benefits of renewable energy pathways. States with significant renewable resources are prime candidates for early adoption of wind and solar power. The analysis emphasizes the importance of a decentralized approach to energy policy, allowing states to tailor strategies to their unique circumstances.

Time-of-use (ToU) tariffs bring important benefits to consumers and society, but some individuals may find it harder to benefit from them than others. Communication around ToU tariffs needs to explain both benefits and challenges successfully. This article presents results from a pre-registered experiment with N = 1300 consumers in Ireland that pre-tested behaviourally-informed communications on ToU tariffs. Consumers were generally positive towards ToU tariffs. Emphasising environmental benefits enhanced positivity among younger participants. Comprehension and choice quality were modest, but improved when tariff examples were presented in a plain table, compared to 24hour clock formats that are commonly used in the market internationally.

The power industry remains a central focus of modern climate mitigation policies because of its significant contribution to global GHG emissions and increased global electricity demand. This paper examines Kazakhstan's coal-based power-generation companies' responses to a national emissions trading scheme (ETS) regulation introduced in 2013 by applying corporate climate strategy and sociotechnical systems frameworks. The in-depth case study is based on 20 interviews with managers of the six largest Kazakhstan coal-based generators and ten interviews with independent industry experts. The empirical data indicate that Kazakhstan's ETS has impacted the country's generators. The companies have responded in the form of non-compliance (i.e., application for additional free allowances), compliance (i.e., purchase of allowances from the ETS), and compliance-plus activities (i.e., exploring investment into renewable energy and fuel switching to natural gas). At the same time, Kazakhstan's generators continue the business-as-usual approach by investing in modernizing their coal-generating assets. Therefore, Kazakhstan may consider complementing its ETS regulation with additional policy reforms to support its ambitious objective to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060.

Persuading end users in utility-controlled operation of heat pumps and electric vehicles (EVs) charging is challenging. In this study, we designed a randomized control trial in which the utility communicated the rationale for deploying direct load control programmes of heat pumps and EVs framed in terms of environment-related (supporting integration of renewables to fight climate change) or grid-related purposes (helps managing the grid) to two groups. The results indicate that the rationale of ‘grid-related purposes’ resonated more with respondents, with higher acceptance for both devices. We highlight determinant perceptions towards the rationales and (mis)alignments in motivations and propose communication strategies.

This study delves into the scholarly discourse surrounding prosumers, aiming to chart their historical progression and explore the primary topics that have garnered attention in scientific research. While the concept first appeared in academic literature in 1986, a significant surge in interest was observed starting in 2010, with momentum steadily increasing to the present day. Utilizing the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) method to examine the abstracts of nearly 1400 publications indexed in the Web of Science, this research uncovers three principal subjects that dominate academic inquiry related to prosumers: grid connection and system integration, market and technologies.