Achieving a high share of non-hydro renewable integration in Brazil through wind power: Regional growth and employment effects

Tiago B. Diniz and Lilia Caiado Couto

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2024, vol. 197, issue C

Abstract: Brazil is a case of the achievement of a high share of wind energy integration to an interconnected power system in an emerging market. A series of successful energy supply programmes and a strong renewable-oriented finance framework implemented since 2002, have promoted alternative renewables – wind installed capacity increased over 22-fold from 927 MW in 2011 to 21 GW in 2022, reaching 11.77% of total procured power. From this, about 90% are concentrated in Brazil's least developed region, the Northeast, where wind investment should create jobs and propel socioeconomic development. Despite that, there is no studies specific assessing the regional and economy-wide effects of those programmes, gap that this paper aims to fill by applying the regional Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model TERM-BR10. We assess that by modelling an alternative scenario for the period 2010-19 based on an official electricity matrix built in 2010, that projected 3.4 additional GW of wind power while not considering all the success of renewable policies, against the observed installed capacity expansion, where wind power was 3.7 times higher than what had been planned. Our results show that in the absence of renewable policies, Brazil would have faced economic losses such as GDP (−0.27%) and investment (−4.76%). The Northeast region would have been the most impacted in terms of GDP (−1.3%), real wage (−2.99%) and employment creation (−0.1%). We propose that such socioeconomic co-benefits are incorporated in energy planning, which could promote regional equality through renewable energy expansion.

Keywords: Wind power; Renewable energy policy; Regional growth; Employment; Computable general equilibrium; Emerging markets; Brazil (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S136403212400090X
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:197:y:2024:i:c:s136403212400090x

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.2024.114367

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 ().