Real options approach to renewable energy investments in Mongolia

Neal Detert and Koji Kotani

No EMS_2012_10, Working Papers from Research Institute, International University of Japan

Abstract: Many developing nations are in transition from non-renewable to renewable energy in electricity generation. This research analyzes this type of changing investment environment for renewable energy projects such as wind farms and solar-thermal plants with the application of real options theory. The main intent is to explore the potential and to provide further insights for such a transition in developing economies through studying the case of Mongolia under coal price uncertainty. To evaluate the comparative attractiveness of either continuing to use non-renewable (coal-based) infrastructure or switching to renewable energy, we formulate social revenue functions for the two environments under the assumptions that coal-based operations generate negative externalities and renewable energy is externality-free. Framing the problem as a type of real options, we arrive at the optimal trigger prices of coal for switching technologies. With this analytical framework, we further pose some possible scenarios with respect to electricity price as well as negative externality valuation, and characterize when renewable energy investments become attractive. In sharp contrast to conventional wisdom in real options theory, we identify some situations where option values for switching technologies become negative in some price domains, and welfare losses are incurred. Overall, the result raises the possible risks in developing nations that waiting to switch energy sources yields huge losses under input price uncertainty. To avoid such a case in Mongolia, the government should remove coal subsidies and increase electricity prices or switch to renewable energy earlier rather than holding the option to wait, especially when people are willing to pay more for the removal of negative externalities.

Keywords: Alternative energy investment; Real options in discrete time; Coal prices; Stochastic process (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C61 G11 O13 Q32 Q42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 pages
Date: 2012-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene and nep-env
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.iuj.ac.jp/workingpapers/index.cfm?File=EMS_2012_10.pdf First version, 2012 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Real options approach to renewable energy investments in Mongolia (2013)
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:iuj:wpaper:ems_2012_10

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Research Institute, International University of Japan 777 Kokusai-cho, Minami Uonuma0-shi, Niigata 949-7277 JAPAN. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Kazumi Imai, Office of Academic Affairs ().