Transition pathways of household heating in Serbia: Analysis based on an agent-based model

Boban Pavlović, Dejan Ivezić and Marija Živković

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2022, vol. 163, issue C

Abstract: To explore pathways of the energy transition of household heating, an agent-based simulation model was developed for the case of the Serbian household sector. The model is focused on individual entities (households) with the objective to explore the effects of policy instruments on energy transition in households with individual heating systems. Empirically collected survey data were used as input for households’ attitudes towards sustainable heating. Simulations showed that the proposed instruments would lead to higher heating efficiency and less air pollution, and impact climate change. However, despite the introduced instruments, a proportion of households (around 11%) will not switch current obsolete firewood-based heating to more efficient heating in the observed period. The main reasons for this phenomenon are a low economic standard, accompanied by ignorance on the part of the population regarding the environmental and climate effects of outdated technologies. Sensitivity analysis was conducted to investigate the effects of different heating system prices, energy prices, and efficiencies, on the transition towards sustainable heating. It was shown that the introduction of a carbon electricity tax would cause a slight increase in the use of firewood and fossil fuels, while local pollution taxation would be an impulse for the use of electricity for heating. The increased energy efficiency of buildings is stimulative for more efficient heating systems. Mass utilization of heat pump technology and renewable energy sources could be expected with obtained maturity in technologies and consequently, the reduction of their prices.

Keywords: Energy transition; Agent-based modeling; Heating systems; Household sector; Renewable energy; CO2 emissions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032122004105
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:rensus:v:163:y:2022:i:c:s1364032122004105

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/600126/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 600126/bibliographic

DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2022.112506

Access Statistics for this article

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews is currently edited by L. Kazmerski

More articles in Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().