Wealth Transfers Among Large Customers from Implementing Real-Time Retail Electricity Pricing

Severin Borenstein

The Energy Journal, 2007, vol. 28, issue 2, 131-150

Abstract: Adoption of real-time electricity pricing—retail prices that vary hourly to reflect changing wholesale prices—removes existing cross-subsidies to those customers that consume disproportionately more when wholesale prices are highest. If their losses are substantial, these customers are likely to oppose RTP initiatives unless there is a supplemental program to offset their loss. Using data on a sample of 1142 large industrial and commercial customers in northern California, I show that RTP adoption would result in significant transfers compared to a flat-rate tariff. When compared to the time-of-use rates (simple peak/offpeak tariffs) that these customers already face, however, the transfers drop by up to 45%; even under the more extreme price volatility scenario that I examine, 90% of customers would see changes of between a 4% bill reduction and an 8% bill increase. Though customer price responsiveness reduces the loss incurred by those with high-cost demand profiles, I also demonstrate that this offsetting effect is unlikely to be large enough for most customers with costly demand patterns to completely offset their lost cross-subsidy. The analysis suggests that adoption of real-time pricing may be difficult without a supplemental program that compensates the customers who are made worse off by the change. I examine possible “two-part RTP†programs, which allow customers to purchase a baseline quantity at regulated TOU rates, and show they can be used to greatly reduce the transfers associated with adoption of RTP.

Keywords: Real-time electricity pricing (RTP); Wealth transfers; volatility; California (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:enejou:v:28:y:2007:i:2:p:131-150

DOI: 10.5547/ISSN0195-6574-EJ-Vol28-No2-6

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