The Regulatory Noose: Logan City’s Adventures in Micro-Hydropower

Megan Hansen, Randy T. Simmons and Ryan Yonk
Additional contact information
Megan Hansen: Department of Economics and Finance, Utah State University, Logan, UT 84322, USA
Randy T. Simmons: Department of Economics and Finance, Utah State University, Logan, UT 84322, USA

Energies, 2016, vol. 9, issue 7, 1-16

Abstract: Recent growth in the renewable energy industry has increased government support for alternative energy. In the United States, hydropower is the largest source of renewable energy and also one of the most efficient. Currently, there are 30,000 megawatts of potential energy capacity through small- and micro-hydro projects throughout the United States. Increased development of micro-hydro could double America’s hydropower energy generation, but micro-hydro is not being developed at the same rate as other renewable sources. Micro-hydro is regulated by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and subject to the same regulation as large hydroelectric projects despite its minimal environmental impact. We studied two cases of micro-hydro projects in Logan, Utah, and Afton, Wyoming, which are both small rural communities. Both cases showed that the web of federal regulation is likely discouraging the development of micro-hydro in the United States by increasing the costs in time and funds for developers. Federal environmental regulation like the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act, and others are likely discouraging the development of clean renewable energy through micro-hydro technology.

Keywords: hydropower; regulation; renewable energy; micro-hydropower (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/9/7/482/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/9/7/482/ (text/html)

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:gam:jeners:v:9:y:2016:i:7:p:482-:d:72581

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().