The interplay among COVID-19 economic recovery, behavioural changes, and the European Green Deal: An energy-economic modelling perspective

Gabriele Cassetti, Baptiste Boitier, Alessia Elia, Pierre Le Mouël, Maurizio Gargiulo, Paul Zagamé, Alexandros Nikas, Konstantinos Koasidis, Haris Doukas and Alessandro Chiodi

Energy, 2023, vol. 263, issue PC

Abstract: In the EU, COVID-19 and associated policy responses led to economy-wide disruptions and shifts in services demand, with considerable energy-system implications. The European Commission's response paved the way towards enhancing climate ambition through the European Green Deal. Understanding the interactions among environmental, social, and economic dimensions in climate action post-COVID thus emerged as a key challenge. This study disaggregates the implications of climate ambition, speed of economic recovery from COVID-19, and behavioural changes due to pandemic-related measures and/or environmental concerns for EU transition dynamics, over the next decade. It soft-links two large-scale energy-economy models, EU-TIMES and NEMESIS, to shed light on opportunities and challenges related to delivering on the EU's 2030 climate targets. Results indicate that half the effort required to reach the updated 55% emissions reduction target should come from electricity decarbonisation, followed by transport. Alongside a post-COVID return to normal, the European Green Deal may lead to increased carbon prices and fossil-fuel rebounds, but these risks may be mitigated by certain behavioural changes, gains from which in transport energy use would outweigh associated consumption increases in the residential sector. Finally, the EU recovery mechanism could deliver about half the required investments needed to deliver on the 2030 ambition.

Keywords: Europe; Energy-economic modelling; European green deal; COVID-19; Economic recovery; Behavioural change (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:263:y:2023:i:pc:s0360544222026846

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2022.125798

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