Evaluating Policies to Increase Electricity Generation from Renewable Energy

Richard Schmalensee

Review of Environmental Economics and Policy, 2012, vol. 6, issue 1, 45-64

Abstract: Building on a review of experience in the United States and the European Union, this article advances four main propositions concerning policies aimed at increasing electricity generation from renewable energy. First, who bears the short-run costs of programs to subsidize the generation of electricity from renewable sources varies with the organization of the electric power industry, and this variation may be a significant contributor to such programs' political attractiveness in U.S. states. Second, despite the greater popularity of feed-in tariff schemes worldwide, renewable portfolio standard (RPS) programs may involve less long-run social risk. Third, in contrast to the European Union's approach to reducing carbon dioxide emissions, its renewables program is almost certain not to minimize the cost of achieving its goals. Fourth, state RPS programs in the United States are also almost certain to cost more than necessary, even though most use market mechanisms. To support this last proposition I provide a fairly detailed description of actual markets for renewable energy credits and their shortcomings. Copyright 2012, Oxford University Press.

Date: 2012
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (86)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/reep/rer020 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:oup:renvpo:v:6:y:2012:i:1:p:45-64

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://academic.oup.com/journals

Access Statistics for this article

Review of Environmental Economics and Policy is currently edited by Robert Stavins

More articles in Review of Environmental Economics and Policy from Association of Environmental and Resource Economists Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP, UK. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().