Ratcheting up policy stringency through sequencing

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While in the EU the past decade can be characterized mostly by getting climate policies into place and refining them, the challenge ahead for the next decade is to substantially increase their stringency. In the first decade of this century, many of the policies considered to become the backbone for achieving these targets were developed and implemented. First of all the EU’s Emission Trading Scheme became operational in 2005, although with very weak reduction targets and primarily to achieve the Kyoto protocol obligations. In 2008 the EU adopted the 2020 climate & energy package, which entailed relatively modest targets for GHG emission reductions, renewable energy use, and energy efficiency. Around ten years later the ETS is expected to have overcome its long lasting “prices crisis” (in the wake of the 2018 reform), CO2 emission standards for cars and trucks are being tightened, and a new governance mechanisms for renewable support with complementary EU mechanisms has been agreed upon as part of the “Clean Energy for All Europeans” package.

Yet the targets of the next decades are considerably more ambitious and require even more stringent policies. For the EU Long Term Strategy, a number of scenarios were developed that project the achievement of the 2030 targets as agreed in June 2018, and aim at long-term emission reductions of at least 85% by 2050 (from 1990 levels). While these scenarios are underpinned by a range of assumed policies, it is by no means clear that these policies can be implemented and ratcheted up as needed. For instance, the current price in the EU ETS – even though it has quadrupled in the last two years – still seems to be far away from driving decarbonization in the power and industry sectors at the rate required. A core question is thus: how must policies be designed in order to allow for such ‘ratcheting’?

Climate policies as sequences that can overcome barriers to higher ambition
In recent work (Pahle et al) we examined how climate policy today may be effectively designed to lay the groundwork for more stringent climate policy in the future—what we call policy ‘sequencing’. Such advance thinking is essential, because as the Roman emperor and philosopher Marcus Aurelius put it: “the impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.”

The core mechanism is illustrated in the figure below: the effects of policies implemented at an initial stage (t1) remove or relax stringency barriers over time so that policymakers can ratchet up stringency at the subsequent stage (t2).

In this work we also identify at least four categories of barriers: costs (both due to the cost of new forms of decarbonization technology, and due to the economic costs of more or less efficient policy choices); distributional effects (the winners and losers of any specific climate policy choice); institutions and governance (where capacity limits and veto points might prevent the enactment of more stringent policy) and free-riding concerns (where some jurisdictions may not adopt climate policies in the hope of free-riding off of the climate policy achievements of other jurisdictions). After exploring ways in which those barriers might be reduced or eliminated, we finally draw on the cases of Germany and California to provide specific examples of how sequencing works.

Applying sequencing to strengthen the EU ETS.
The concept of sequencing is not only a useful approach for explaining what has enabled ratcheting in the past – it can also be used strategically to design current and future policies. In the following we apply the sequencing framework to the EU ETS to illustrate the concept and discuss implications for policy choices. A first aspect is that strong myopia of market participants could lead to persistently lower ETS price, which eventually might rise sharply towards the end of the next trading period (“hockey stick”). Such a sharp rise would face strong political opposition, possibly jeopardizing the ratcheting up of the policy. A remedy could be a minimum carbon price, which would balance prices over time as described for example by Flachsland et al.

Overcoming the waterbed effect
In a similar vein, the EU ETS has long been challenged by the problem of overlapping policies on the national level, which reduce demand for certificates, thus depressing ETS prices, and thereby inducing the ‘waterbed effect’ that other countries emit more. Again, a minimum carbon price could alleviate this problem, an EU-wide minimum price seems to be politically infeasible at least in the near future. Suitable policy sequencing could over time reduce this barrier. For example, recent work (Osorio et al) with a focus on the German coal phase out, examined how a coalition of ambitious countries could implement such a price floor to reduce the short-term waterbed effect. In order to prevent leakage to future trading periods, they would have to cancel allowances equivalent to the level of additional mitigation the price floor would induce – an option that was made more prominent in the last reform of the ETS,. Such a coalition could grow over time and eventually create a majority to also implement a carbon price floor in the full EU ETS.

Energy decarbonization & Coal phase-out: financial, technological and policy drivers

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The 24th Conference of the Parties (COP) closed in Katowice on December 15th, 2018. After two intense weeks of talks and crunch negotiations (with ‘overtime’), the almost 200 parties in the conference managed to agree on a 133-page rule-book which guides the implementation of the Paris Agreement. These guidelines specify how the Paris commitments will be measured, implemented and monitored. The “Katowice package” represents an important achievement ensuring a high degree of transparency in decarbonization, especially in light of recent geo-political challenges to this process. Yet, the parties could not see eye-to-eye on several key issues, including the rules for voluntary carbon markets of Article 6 of the Paris Treaty.

Indeed, the slow and convoluted negotiation process clashed with the call for urgency by the scientific community. According to the latest Special Report of the IPCC on 1.5 degrees, time is of the essence. Inaction has high costs. At current rates, by 2040 the world mean global temperature will be 1 degree higher than in 1990. And this could happen even sooner, with greenhouse gas emissions rising again this year after a couple of years of stagnation. Furthermore, limiting temperature increase to 1.5 degrees (rather than simply ‘well below’ 2 degrees as called for in the Paris Agreement) would significantly lower the risk of negative climate impacts. But the more we wait to take mitigation – and adaption – actions, the more expensive it will be to tackle these problems.

The need to find political consensus to push forward the decarbonization agenda is only one of the barriers to decarbonization. Other crucial financial, technological and policy barriers exist, especially with respect to the need to phase out fossil fuels, and coal in particular. Some of these barriers were presented and discussed at the COP side event “Energy decarbonization & Coal phase-out: financial, technological and policy drivers” held on December 3rd, 2018 in the EU Pavilion. The session showcased the latest research insights from ongoing research projects and from practitioners engaged in promoting decarbonization on the ground in energy and carbon intensive European countries.

Crucial role of technologies, policies and finance

Elena Verdolini from the RFF-CMCC European Institute on Economics and the Environment, presented initial results from the INNOPATHS project, a four-year EU H2020 project that aims to work with key economic and societal actors to generate new, state-of-the-art low-carbon pathways for the European Union. Her presentation was structured around three key INNOPATHS outputs. First, the “Technology Matrix”, an online database presenting information on the cost of low-carbon technologies and their performance, including both historic and current data, and future estimates. The key feature of this database is the collection of a wide variety of data from different data sources, and the computation of metrics to measure the uncertainty around values. The matrix will thus contribute to mapping technological improvements (and associated uncertainty) in key economic sectors, including energy, buildings and industry. It will show that many low-carbon technologies options are available in certain sectors, but also the specific technological gaps characterizing many hard-to-decarbonize sectors, including aviation, or energy-intensive manufacturing sectors such as chemicals and heavy metals. For these technologies, additional and dedicated Research, Development, Demonstration and Deployment funding will need to be a priority.

The second key output is the “Policy Evaluation Tool”; an online repository of evidence on the effect of policy interventions against key metrics, such as environmental impact (i.e. emission reductions), labour market and competitiveness outcomes. The tool will become a repository of evidence on what approaches and policy instruments work, or do not work, helping policy makers to understand how best to achieve various goals related to the energy transition.

The third key output are insights from INNOPATHS researchers focusing on the financing of the decarbonization process. First, similarly to the process of industrial production, financing costs benefit from “learning-by-financing”, as lenders develop in-house abilities and experience in the selection of renewable energy projects. Second, researchers focus on the importance that public investments can play in signaling change and promoting a shift of investments away from fossil and towards low- and zero-carbon technologies. In this respect, public banks are crucial actors, which can act as catalysts for private investments.

A shrinking role for coal

Laurence Watson, from Carbon Tracker, summarized the main insights from a recently-released report and online portal that provides a well-rounded assessment of the economics of coal-fired power plants across the world. The key point emerging from this analysis is that coal is that nearly half of all coal plants are currently unprofitable, set to rise to three quarters by 2040. Prevailing economics, nascent carbon pricing and an increased focus on the impacts of air pollution are driving this trend. In many regions renewables are rapidly approaching a cost that will be cheaper than operating existing coal plants, and by 2030 this will be the case in most markets. This means stranded assets in the power sector, and pressure on policymakers to not subsidize ailing coal fleets.

There is good evidence that coal’s contribution to gross domestic product and employment has shrunk over time – including in coal-intensive regions. This novel analysis provides important evidence for policy-makers and investors willing to align with the Paris Agreement climate targets. All the data is easily accessible through a data-driven interactive web-based tool which shows the cost and profitability of almost all of global coal-fired capacity.

Coal decline visible also for Silesia

Oskar Kulik of WWF Poland presented the impact of the declining role of coal through the example of Silesia, Poland, the largest hard coal mining area in the EU. While coal mining does still play an important role in the regional economy, its role is declining: from over 15% of the regional GDP in 1995 down to 6% currently, and from 300,000 jobs in the early 1990s, to around. 75,000 today (while maintaining unemployment rates below the national average).

Based on recent research by WiseEuropa the most important factors in this decline are the growing costs of coal extraction, driven by factors largely independent of low-carbon policy. Irrespective of the drivers, the region will be faced with socio-economic challenges as a result of such pressures. As such, the main recommendation is to plan for this transition in a way that will be just for the local communities and region as a whole.

Supporting stakeholder in the low-carbon transition

Alexandru Mustață from CEE Bankwatch Network discussed some of the challenges of the low-carbon transition encountered at the grassroots in six coal-intensive Eastern European countries, but also possible solutions. Through a project supported by the European Climate Initiative (www.EUKI.de), CEE Bankwatch Network is able to support knowledge between post-Soviet countries (such as through study tours in to the Czech Republic and Poland during the COP), and by collecting resources from researchers, trade unions, political parties or NGOs on a central platform. Many stakeholders from these regions are ready for alternative growth pathways, but lack the support (in the form of politics, policy, experience or infrastructure) to make it happen.

The common thread across all contributions was the importance of focusing on how macro-level decarbonization goals and commitment are presented, communicated and implemented at the local level. The core concern underlying COP24 was the need to tackle climate change but ensuring a just, inclusive transition that supports those groups and regions that may be hit hardest.

Promoting the energy transition through innovation

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With the striking exception of the USA, countries around the world are committed to the implementation of stringent targets on anthropogenic carbon emissions, as agreed in the Paris Climate Agreement. Indeed, for better or for worse, the transition towards decarbonization is a collective endeavour, with the main challenge being a technological one. The path from a fossil-based to a sustainable and low-carbon economy needs to be paved through the development and deployment of low-carbon energy technologies which will allow to sustain economic growth while cutting carbon emissions.

Unfortunately, not all countries have access to the technologies which are necessary for this challenging transition. This in turn casts serious doubts on the possibility to achieve deep decarbonisation. Developed countries accumulated significant know-how in green technologies in the last decades, but most of developing and emerging countries do not have strong competences in this specific field. Yet, it is in these latter countries that energy demand, and hence carbon emissions, will increase dramatically in the years to come. The issue at stake is how to reconcile the need for a global commitment to the energy transition with the reality of largely unequal country-level technological competences.

Public R&D investments play an important role in the diffusion and deployment of low-carbon technologies. Public investment in research is the oldest way by which countries have supported renewable energy technologies. For instance, following the two oil crises of the 1970s, the United States invested a significant amount of public resources in research and development on wind and solar technologies, with a subsequent increase of innovation activities in these fields. The same pattern can be observed in the last two decades in Europe, where solar, wind and other low carbon technologies have been supported by public money. But innovation policies and R&D investments are only one of the possible ways in which governments can stimulate low-carbon innovation.

Environmental policies are another way to stimulate clean innovation, which comes as an additional pay-off of emissions reduction. Usually, governments rely on two different types of environmental policy instruments: command-and-control policies, such as emission or efficiency standards, and market-based policies, such as carbon taxies or pollution permits. The former put a limit on the quantity of pollutant that firms and consumers can emit. The latter essentially work by putting an explicit price on pollution. Both types of instruments have the direct effect of lowering carbon emission in the short term. In the longer term, they also have the indirect effect of promoting low-carbon innovation. This is because they make it worth for firms to bring to the market new, improved technologies. Over the past decades, countries have implemented different low-carbon policy portfolios, namely a combination of different policy instruments to foster the development and deployment of low-carbon technologies. The combination of R&D, command-and-control and market-based policies varies greatly across countries.

A crucial question often debated in the literature is: which policy instrument is more effective in promoting innovation in renewable technologies vis-à-vis innovation in efficient fossil-based technologies? Importantly, low-carbon innovation can refer either to renewable technologies, which effectively eliminate carbon emissions from production processes, or to more efficient fossil-based technologies, which decrease the content of carbon per unit of production. Favouring the former type of innovation over the latter is strategically important in the long-run: renewable technologies allow to completely decouple economic growth from carbon emissions. Conversely, fossil-based technologies may give rise to rebound effects, namely increase in overall energy demand (and possibly also in overall emissions) because they make it cheaper to use fossil inputs.

A recent study by Nesta et al. (2018) shows that certain combinations of research and environmental policy instruments are more effective in promoting renewable energy innovation than others. More specifically, there is no ‘one-fits-all’ solution when it comes to choosing the optimal combination of market-based or command-and-control environmental policies. Au contraire, to be effective in promoting renewable innovation, policy portfolios need to be tailored to the specific capability of each country. The study relies on data on innovation in low-carbon and fossil-based technologies in OECD countries and large emerging economies (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and Indonesia, BRIICS) over the years 1990-2015. The authors apply an empirical methodology that allows to test how effective each “policy mix” is in promoting innovation, depending on the level of specialization of each country in terms of green innovation.

The analysis shows that there are three different regimes of low-carbon specialization. The first one characterizes those countries with extremely low competences in green technologies as compared to fossil-based technologies. This accounts for about half of the observations in the study, including the BRICS countries. In this case, the research suggests, the only effective way to promote the redirection of technological expertise towards green technologies is through direct investment in low carbon R&D.

The second regime does come into play until a country shows enough specialization in green technologies. In this regime, environmental policies start to become effective in further consolidating the green technological specialization. The successful innovation strategy in this case is that which combines command-and-control policy instruments – which lower the incentives associated with fossil innovation – with market-based policies – which increase the incentives associated with green innovation.

The third regime is characterized by a substantial specialization in green know-how. This regime includes only 12 percent of the observations in the study. In this last case, market-based instruments alone are effective in sustaining green innovation vis-à-vis innovation in fossil technologies.

Countries which tailor their policy portfolio based on their level of competencies will be more successful in promoting renewable innovation. A clear example of the dynamics behind this finding is illustrated by Denmark. In the pre-Kyoto period, Denmark had not yet reached the required level of expertise in renewable energy. The country continued to invested heavily in building such expertise through significant investments in renewable research and innovation. As a result, Denmark moved to the second regime. At that point, the country strengthened both command and control and market-based policy instruments, further promoting renewable innovation vis-à-vis innovation in fossil-based technologies. This resulted in an even higher level of competencies in renewables, bringing Denmark to the third regime. The country was then in a position to switch away from command-and-control instruments and simply rely on market-based instruments to promote renewable innovation.

Countries which fail to tailor their policy portfolio are not successful in promoting renewable energy innovation. For instance, France represents a case of failure, as illustrated by our results. The lack of an adequate market-based support for renewables in the nineties led to the full dissipation of the French early advantage in these technologies. Indeed, France was the only country that is in the third regime in the first period and was then in an ideal position to implement ambitious policies before other countries, thus keeping its relative technological advantage. Instead, the country chose to fully specialize in nuclear energy. This eroded France’s capability in renewable energy innovation. This implies that France cannot simply rely on market-based instruments to successfully promote renewable innovation nowadays.

These results are of interest for emerging economies, and suggest that countries like Brazil, Russia, India, Indonesia, China and South Africa should be less timid in strengthening the stringency of both types of policy instruments, because they are well positioned to fully benefit from the innovation incentives. Fast-developing countries desperately need to build innovative capacity in renewable energy technologies and promote their diffusion. Apart from India and, to a lesser extent, Indonesia, all countries have built a satisfactory level of expertise in renewables. This calls for the implementation of both market-based and command-and-control policy instruments as means to embark on a virtuous renewable innovation circle. China stands out due to a high level of expertise in green technologies. Overall, their level of expertise in renewables is such that they would be in the position to fully benefit from the innovation incentives associated with more stringent mitigation policies in support of the energy transition.

 

Revolutions at sea – reflecting on the cost of offshore wind

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The costs of offshore wind are falling dramatically. Several European countries have now agreed to buy power from offshore wind farms at costs which challenge the notion that renewable energy must be heavily subsidised to survive.

The UK government has recently awarded contracts to offshore wind projects scheduled for the early 2020s, at prices 50-60% lower than those it handed to offshore wind projects in 2014.  Germany and the Netherlands have recently announced contracts, also for expected delivery in the early 2020s, in which offshore wind developers have agreed to receive the market price only – zero subsidy contracts.

What has caused these rapid cost reductions? Can we expect the costs of offshore wind contracts to remain at these relatively low levels, or even to reduce further?

The cost reductions are likely to have had a few contributing factors, several of which can be seen optimistically as factors that will continue to keep costs low in the future.

One such factor is an innovation relating to policy design. The payment level received by offshore wind projects is now increasingly decided not by governments, but by requesting companies to bid in for the contract, declaring the price at which they would be prepared to deliver it. Such auction-based systems allow governments to choose the lowest cost of the now revealed bids. It seems plausible that the move towards auction-based allocation systems may have helped to drive down prices by introducing price competition into the bidding process.

Technological improvement is an important factor for enabling such cost reductions. There has been a clear trend towards larger and more efficient turbines which can deliver greater amounts of energy, increasing return on investment, thereby lowering costs. The trend is set to continue, with one major company expecting the turbines they will use in 2024 to be double the current size.

However, other factors that could explain the recent low bids may give a less clear grounds for optimism that the low prices are here to stay.

It is possible that companies may currently be bidding low for strategic reasons. For some companies, a lower return may be considered worthwhile, at the present time, for the benefit of maintaining their project supply chains. If subsidies in some previous rounds were overly generous, as some have suggested, it might be that this is currently enabling some flexibility on the balance sheet for low bids. If this is part of the explanation, such strategic bidding could not be maintained in the long run.

Auction design can also incentivise companies to put in bids lower than they would ideally accept, if they believe that another project will bid in higher and set the price received by all selected bids. However, if such a strategy backfires then a company could win a contract but at a price at which it is impossible to deliver the project – sometimes called “the winner’s curse”.

Another important factor likely to be lowering costs at the present time is the relatively low cost of financing. Investors have increased familiarity with offshore wind, and the long term contracts being issued by governments help to manage uncertainty, enabling lenders to lend at lower rates of interest. However, there are also important external conditions – interest rates in general are exceptionally low at the moment. As interest rates are likely to rise again in the future, it is possible that this could add to the cost of future projects.

Costs of projects are also strongly affected by site conditions, such as distance from shore and depth of water. There is a limited number of sites close to shore and in shallow water, and if future sites are in deeper water and further from shore this could drive up costs.

It is also important to recall that not all costs associated with offshore wind farms are necessarily accounted for in the costs paid for by project developers, and thus covered by the subsidies. Important additional costs are the costs of connections to power grids, and of balancing the system, for example in the event of too much power being injected on to the grid at the wrong time and wrong place. Because wind turbines have variable output dependent on wind conditions, they can exert significant costs on the system in this way. In some countries generators must pay for, or at least make a contribution towards these kinds of costs. In other countries, generators are not required to cover their own balancing and transmission costs, as these are met by the network operator. This is an important contributing factor towards the difference in costs between offshore wind projects in different European countries. Clearly, systems that do not target transmission and balancing costs at generators to some extent create favourable conditions for offshore wind, and they certainly make achieving zero-subsidy auctions more likely. However, if not paid by generators, transmission and balancing costs still have to be covered by system operators and are ultimately paid for by consumers. Thus, there is a strong argument that to herald a ‘zero-subsidy’ auction within a system that does not direct transmission and balancing costs at generators is misleading – especially if offshore wind exerts greater than average transmission and balancing costs – as the socialisation of transmission and balancing costs is a clear subsidy. Giving generators some kind of signal as to the costs their output imposes on the network is an important part of developing a well-balanced and efficient system. While shielding offshore wind generators from these costs may have attractions in the short term, it could lead to greater costs in the longer term, if it means the system develops in a way that is harder and more expensive to balance.

Of course, the news of extremely low prices for offshore wind contracts is to be welcomed. However, rather than becoming too focussed on zero-subsidy auctions as ends in themselves, we should continue to pay attention to making policies that look robust across all market conditions: long-term policy stability; careful attention to auction design; allocating transmission and balancing costs to support rational network development and incentivise innovations in storage and flexibility; and supporting and coordinating innovation chains.

INNOPATHS in the European Sustainable Energy Week #EUSEW18

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This year, the EU Sustainable Energy Week celebrated its 13th anniversary and INNOPATHS was invited to present some of its early results in this important event. The EU Sustainable Energy Week, which took place in Brussels last week (June 4-8), is the annual flagship event in the EU in which sustainable energy policy is at the centre of the debates and discussions among stakeholders from the governmental, industrial, academic, and non-for-profit communities. The European Commission´s Directorate General for Energy (DG Energy) and the Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (EASME) join forces by focusing the 2018  conference on the theme – “Lead the clean energy transition”.

The theme clearly resonated. The conference included 60 sessions and more than 2,500 participants. We found that discussions involving energy efficiency policies attracted special interest during last week. With the revised Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) on the table, Ms. Mechthild Wörsdörfer, Director in charge of renewables, research and innovation, energy efficiency of the DG Energy of the European Commission, highlighted that energy efficiency will bring “multiple benefits, such as lower cost of the energy transition, reduced energy bills for the most vulnerable, a more lenient and competitive EU economy, higher quality of life and cleaner air and environment”.

Since INNOPATHS is an innovative project in substance and form aiming to generate new state-of-the-art low-carbon pathways for the European Union, we did not want to miss out on the opportunity to contribute to the discussion of policies to facilitate deep energy renovation in buildings.

I presented the work of the University of Cambridge (with Prof. Laura Diaz-Anadon), the Euro-Mediterranean Centre on Climate Change (CMCC) (Dr. Elena Verdolini) and the European University Institute (Dr. Stefano Verde) developing one of the four innovative online tools coming out of the project.  In particular, I provided some early results from the prototype of the online Policy Evaluation Tool, which we designed with Nice&Serious (N&S) (Peter Larkin and his team), to inform policy makers and other stakeholders on the impacts of different policies on a wide range of outcomes (including economic, environmental, and social) in a panel with Commission and other European project representatives.

I presented INNOPATHS insights on the main innovations of the project, the barriers encountered for deep renovation of the residential building stock in the EU, as well as policy recommendations to overcome those obstacles. Using a systematic review of research on Building Codes and White Certificates collected for the Policy Evaluation Tool prototype, we presented some of the barriers envisioned for deep renovation in buildings to improve energy efficiency, among others:

  1. A poor understanding of the causes of policy failures in the buildings sector
  2. Aged building stock in some EU jurisdictions
  3. Lack of evidence in or applicable to Southern European contexts
  4. Aversion towards more stringent regulatory policies
  5. Lack of trust in the realization of expected savings
  6. Non-negligible welfare impacts in low income households

I found that the introduction of the Policy Evaluation Tool received a warm welcome and interest from the many attendees to the session on Deep Energy Renovation.

In addition to the panel, the audience were able to contribute to the debate by answering the following question: “According to you, which are the most important barriers hampering wide-scale energy renovation in Europe”. With 43 answers, 44% of the respondents said that the lack of knowledge and interest of the building owners was the main barrier, followed by a 30% who highlighted the lack of convincing financing solutions and a 28% reporting that the main obstacle was an unfavourable regulatory environment, incoherent policies and support schemes. These barriers for deep renovation highlighted by the stakeholders are surprisingly aligned with the early findings from the Policy Evaluation Tool on how to overcome key barriers.

Of special interest was the agreement among participants regarding the need to guide EU and national level policies in the building sector towards: the remodelling and renovation of the existing stock of buildings, the important role of finance schemes to undertake such works and the digitalization of the sector. The latter resonates with the recent creation in the UK of the Centre for Digital Built Britain (CDBB). The importance of increasing the ambition of long-term targets for countries in terms of energy efficiency or energy savings, the provision of innovative financial schemes to support digitalisation in buildings, and the need to improve information in an accessible way for households’ owners and tenants to create a demand for green buildings were recurring themes.

All in all, it seems clear that projects such as INNOPATHs are crucial for informing policies in the building sector to continue working towards a sustainable, clean and fair future for everyone.

Christina Penasco @chrispenasco

Energy Performance of Buildings Directive Revisions: What to Know.

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The following is a guest blog by Anthony Gilbert, specialist in real estate and real estate marketing, and owner of The RealFX Group. Improving the energy efficiency of Europe’s buildings is a key element of a successful low-carbon transition. An important focus of the work of INNOPATHS is an examination of the barriers to achieving this objective, and how to overcome them. The blog focusses on the recent revisions to the EU’s Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD), which currently sits at the heart of European policy to encourage energy efficiency in buildings.

The EU has recently changed its Energy Performance of Buildings code to encourage the efficiency of older buildings in the union. This move is just one of eight different proposals that seek to reduce the amount of energy used in EU structures. Right now, the building sector accounts for 40% of all energy use in the EU. With 75% of all buildings in Europe described as energy inefficient, these new proposals seek to renovate buildings in an effort to lower energy consumption by up to 6% and CO2 emissions by up to 5%.

Primary Objectives 

These revisions state that smart technology is to be implemented whenever possible to inefficient buildings. Ultimately, this translates to more automation and better control systems. The larger goal for the EU is to hit 0% emissions by the year 2050. Professionals are instructed to use readiness indicators to determine how easy it will be to integrate the new technology into the building.

Ideally, they’ll be able to piece the resulting data together to determine the best renovation strategies for future structures. The EU is trying to capitalize on just how adaptable technology can be. They see these methods as a chance to stabilize the electricity and to drive the union away from the use of fossil fuels and carbon emissions.

The Role of Member States 

The directives of these revisions are deliberately vague to account for the many anomalies and incongruities of renovation and retrofitting. Member States are given the freedom to accomplish these objectives as they see fit. Each neighborhood is allowed to decide the best way to implement the changes based on not only the physical infrastructure but also the environmental obstacles that may stand in the way of ideal working conditions. The larger EU bureaucracy will only interfere if they feel that Member States are not honoring the revisions or otherwise failing to promote sustainability. As they begin promoting more renovations, homeowners and tenants should start to see their energy bills fall.

A Rise in Jobs

The rate of renovation in the EU is currently between .4 – 1.2%, so there’s a lot of room for growth when it comes to installing smarter energy systems. The construction industry in Europe puts 18 million people to work and is responsible for 9% of Europe’s GDP. These new directives give experts in renovations and retrofits more opportunities to put their knowledge to good work, and it gives novices a chance to learn on the job and transform themselves into the energy protectors of tomorrow. These types of radical turnarounds tend to boost jobs in related sectors. The rise in competition usually results in better products and services, which is truly a win-win for both people and the planet.

Improved Lifestyles

Building inefficiency doesn’t just hurt the environment, it can also hurt the people who reside in the buildings. Humidity, dust, and pollutants can hang in the air of a building that lacks the necessary components to circulate it. Vulnerable groups like children and the elderly are particularly susceptible to illness after repeated exposure. The smarter a building is, the more breathable the air will be and the more comfortable the residents will feel. Ultimately, the EU wants everyone to start taking their energy consumption seriously. By starting with the buildings people live and work in, they hope to spur a larger movement that makes it easy to hit their greenhouse gas goals.

Future Goals 

The EU fully understands that is has a long way to go if they’re hoping to stamp out energy inefficiency in a sector as large as the building industry. However, these revisions are truly a step in the right direction. By encouraging Member States to put their energy into smarter building, they inadvertently create demand for green building. As homeowners, building owners, and tenants start to see their health improve and their energy bills become much more affordable, it will create a new standard of living. Leaders believe that this strategy will help them achieve global leadership in promoting renewable energy.

Every country is responsible for promoting their own version of energy efficiency, but the EU seems to have the right idea by dreaming big. Benefits like job creation, better health, and lower utility bills are developments that everyone can support, regardless of their personal views about our responsibility to preserve the planet for future generations.

Anthony Gilbert is the owner of The RealFX Group. Anthony specializes in real estate and real estate marketing, and likes to follow and promote advancements in accessible and efficient technology for homeowners.

Local and regional governments as pathfinders for the transition to a low-carbon economy

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The energy transition required to mitigate against global warming is rightly regarded as a global, international challenge requiring macro-level shifts in environmental and economic policy, and the role of local and regional governments, be it in developing viable and replicable business models, acting as a lead customer in driving eco-innovative solutions, or using their economic leverage through procurement, can be easy to overlook.

As a global network of cities and regions working on both political advocacy and concrete projects relating to energy transition, ICLEI has established city networks aimed at uptake of renewable energy and setting of low-emissions targets, carrying out eco-innovative energy tenders, as well as community-owned energy projects and road-mapping projects for low-carbon heating and transport in cities.

Regional networks and eco-innovative tenders
The SPP Regions project, which concluded in March 2018, generated over 1000 GWh of renewable energy and achieved its carbon and energy savings targets through eco-innovative tenders carried out in the project’s 7 regional sustainable procurement networks.

Starting in 2015 and coordinated by ICLEI, the project has promoted the creation and expansion of European regional networks of municipalities working together on sustainable public procurement (SPP) and public procurement of innovation (PPI). As it approaches its conclusion, it has saved 395,000 tCO2/year and primary energy totaling 1,425 GWh/year, as well as procuring 1,015 GWh of renewable energy across 39 tenders in 7 countries, involving 31 contracting authorities. Additionally, the project recruited new partner networks in 8 other European regions and worked closely with the Procura+ European Sustainable Procurement Network.

The full list of tender models is available to download on the project website, where a savings calculation methodology used in the GPP2020 project demonstrates how the targets and achievements are quantified. The project has also produced a package of in-depth guidance and a series of ‘how-to’ videos on the implementation of various sustainable procurement practices such as market engagement and circular procurement, as well as the 3rd edition of the Procura+ Manual.

BuyZET – Mapping city’s transportation emissions footprints
Launched in November 2016, the BuyZET project is a partnership of cities aiming to achieve zero emission urban delivery of goods and services through procurement of innovation solutions and the development of city procurement plans.

The project has released a series of reports on the methods and results of the transportation footprint mapping exercise that identifies high priority procurement areas. These procurement areas have the potential, through improved processes and supplier solutions, to impact upon the transportation footprint of a public authority.

The first step in mapping the transportation footprint is to identify and include all activities performed by cities that involve transportation. Each city within the BuyZET project – Copenhagen, Oslo and Rotterdam – has studied the transportation impacts of different types of procurement activities following different methodologies developed within the project. The three reports from Copenhagen, Oslo and Rotterdam are available here, as well as a consolidated summary of the results of the three reports.

Heat Roadmap Europe
Heat Roadmap Europe, which studies heat demand accounting for approximately 85-90% of total heating and cooling in Europe, has issued a brochure which presents an overview of the current state of the energy demand for heating and cooling in the EU.

In March 2018, a workshop hosted by the EU Joint Research Centre and co-organised by Aalborg University and ICLEI, introduced participants to the project’s main mapping and modelling tools to develop national Heat Roadmaps: Forecast, Cost Curves, JRC-EU-TIMES and EnergyPLAN. Together the tools will allow for building technically possible and, socio-economically feasible, decarbonisation scenarios.

Campaigns and initiatives for a low-carbon economy
ICLEI convenes several collaborative initiatives involving energy and emissions targets at the European and global levels:

Cities for Climate Protection Campaign
Local Government Climate Roadmap
Procura+ European Sustainable Procurement Network
Global Lead City Network on Sustainable Procurement

Two main ingredients for a successful energy transition? A diverse financial system and the right policies

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The discussion and action points for moving to an almost carbon-free energy supply have shifted from developing technologies towards a question of how to most effectively and efficiently implement the energy transition without compromising economic development and well-being [1,2]. Transforming our energy systems into more decentralized and renewable energy sources will require a vast deployment of innovations and, accordingly, huge investment. Estimates for the total investment begin at about USD 700 billion, which amounts to a mere 1% of global GDP [3]. There are two key levers to accomplish this task that are cited in almost every publication and report since the early 2000s. These are the use of private financial resources, and an appropriate policy framework. There has been a lively debate about what enabling elements are required for these elements to drive the transition and “shift the trillions” [4].

Financing energy technology innovation – the need for diversity

There is no doubt that the financial sector could, in principle, finance the transition. The financial system gives direction to the development of the real economy. Its traditional role is to mobilize and transform savings into productive investments. However over the last 20 years, driven by consolidation, the race for efficiency and deregulation and financial markets lost a lot of the diversity that is needed to finance innovation (see Figure 1). Many markets are dominated by just a few banks and institutional investors, which have been severely affected by the 2010 financial and subsequent regulation, driving a lot of risk carrying capacity out of banking and insurance markets, which turn provide financing risk-capital such as venture capitalists. The focus of the ecosystem for financing towards debt and later stages of the innovation cycle creates a bias towards calculable risks and, importantly, the maintenance and expansion of the existing capital stock in existing firms rather than new ventures. New forms of alternative finance innovations (such as crowdfunding or community-based credit unions) that could provide the necessary investments might be able to fill this gap, but their volumes are still (too) small. A very important ‘side-effect’ of increasing the diversity of players in financial markets is that the system as a whole becomes more resilient against shocks. Many different players with many different decision heuristics are less prone to making the same errors (Polzin et al. 2017).

Figure 1: Financial instruments to finance clean energy innovation (Source: Polzin et al. 2017)

Policy framework – clear directions and a choice of instruments

Given the current financial landscape we see two main strands of policy interventions to increase both attractiveness of low-carbon energy technologies and the diversity of sources of finance that can be mobilised.

First, innovation policy such as grants for R&D, demonstration support, risk-sharing facilities, tax-credits or Feed-in Tariffs will attract the necessary early-stage investments for future generations of technologies needed for an energy transition (for example organic batteries or power to gas). To overcome the so-called ‘valley of death’ in the innovation chain, public loans or loan guarantees might be suitable, but the risk of over-funding rapidly growing firms should be taken into account. Governments could also invest directly to create a technology ‘track-record’, important for investors [5]. In the later stages of innovation, especially for renewable energy, depending on the design features, portfolio standards or recently popular capacity auctions, prove effective tools. All these efforts should be embedded in a clear and long-term policy strategy consistent with the commitments of the Paris Agreement to be credible to investors. Consistency, stringency and predictability to reduce deep uncertainty and policy risk are deemed especially crucial.

Second, equally important for achieving a mostly privately-financed energy transition are appropriate financial market conditions and regulations [3]. Unprecedented monetary policies in the Eurozone (Quantitative Easing) have driven the cost of debt finance to zero or below and flooded financial markets with cheap debt finance. Still, only very little of that monetary expansion finds its way into the real economy, let alone into clean energy. Framework conditions for either debt or equity-based instruments influence their contribution to a clean energy transition, as a developed capital market is needed to channel resources. In this regard, a fiscal preferential treatment of debt finance, which is widespread today, should be avoided. Typically, interest is deductable as costs, while dividend payments only occur after tax. Policy makers should try to level the playing field across sources of finance. Furthermore capital market regulation shapes investment mandates and risk models and thus ultimately determines the feasibility and viability of investments into clean energy. Regulation (for example Basel III, Solvency II), especially since the financial crisis, is almost exclusively geared towards stability and security. Hence institutional investors and their intermediaries are forced to stay away from risky asset classes such as venture capital. A no-regret solution would be to require financial intermediaries to lower their overall leverage ratio (debt to equity) and operate with more equity. With more ‘skin in the game’, banks and institutional investors can responsibly handle more risk and uncertainty on their balance sheets. New alternative finance such as equity and debt-based crowdfunding are also becoming more regulated in many countries. Regulators should abstain from clamping down on them, for example through a regulatory sandbox.

In sum, to effectively and efficiently mobilise private finance for innovation and diffusion of low-carbon energy technologies, it is paramount to increase diversity of financial sources available in the market and also, next to an adequate innovation policy, adjust financial market regulations and conditions. The INNOPATHS finance workstream, consisting of ETH Zurich, PIK, Allianz Climate Solutions and Utrecht University will further explore the dynamics finance-energy (innovation)-policy dynamics [see for example 5,6].

Resources:

[1] Mazzucato, M., Semieniuk, G., 2018. Financing renewable energy: Who is financing what and why it matters. Technol. Forecast. Soc. Change. 127, 8-22. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2017.05.021

[2] Polzin, F., 2017. Mobilizing private finance for low-carbon innovation – A systematic review of barriers and solutions. Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2017.04.007

[3] Polzin, F., Sanders, M., Täube, F., 2017. A diverse and resilient financial system for investments in the energy transition. Curr. Opin. Environ. Sustain. 28, 24–32. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2017.07.004

[4] Germanwatch, 2017. Shifting the Trillions – The Role of the G20 in Making Financial Flows Consistent with Global Long-Term Climate Goals. https://germanwatch.org/en/13482

[5] Geddes, A., Schmidt, T.S., Steffen, B., 2018. The multiple roles of state investment banks in low-carbon energy finance: an analysis of Australia, the UK and Germany. Energy Policy 115, 158–170. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2018.01.009

[6] Steffen, B., 2018. The importance of project finance for renewable energy projects. Energy Econ. 69, 280–294. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eneco.2017.11.006

A paradigm shift towards renewable energy finance for Sub-Saharan Africa?

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Sub-Saharan Africa is one of the most promising future markets for renewable energy projects in the coming decades. There is a significant effort from project developers and investors to enter the market but huge obstacles hinder the realisation of such projects. For this reason, Allianz Climate Solutions and the Project Development Programme (implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit under the German Energy Solutions Initiative of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy), hosted a workshop in Berlin to discuss possible financing models for CAPEX-free operator models for photovoltaic projects in Ghana and Kenya.

The need for discussion and exchange between investors, project developers and financial institutions as well as policy makers was identified as crucial in order to successfully develop and implement responsive solutions to the upcoming challenges in emerging markets like the Sub-Saharan region.

This blog addresses possible ways of rethinking the transaction process and developing tools for renewable energy projects which could be a step forward to respond to the challenges of emerging markets.

Read full publication here

 

Electric mobility and vehicle-to-grid integration: unexplored questions and benefits

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Reducing energy demand in the transportation sector is one of the most difficult challenges we face to meet our CO2 emission reduction targets. Due to the sector’s dependence on fossil fuel energy sources and the monumental negative consequences for climate change, air pollution and other social impacts, countless researchers, policymakers and other stakeholders view a widespread transition to electric mobility as both feasible and socially desirable.

How do we go about making it happen? As researchers working on low carbon mobility we need to start looking beyond technical challenges and look at the role of consumer acceptance and driver behavior, as well as the role for policy coordination, to move forward. My colleagues and I have been looking at research on vehicle-to-grid (V2G) and vehicle-grid-integration (VGI) and found that the focus has been too narrow so far. To help make the transition to electric mobility happen, we need to understand the benefits of the technology and propose areas where research should expand.

How does V2G work?

V2G and VGI refers to efforts to link the electric power system and the transportation system in ways that can improve the sustainability and security of both. As our figure below illustrates, a V2G configuration means that personal automobiles have the opportunity to become not only vehicles, but mobile, self-contained resources that can manage power flow and displace the need for electric utility infrastructure. They could even begin to sell services back to the grid and/or store large amounts of energy from renewable and distributed sources of supply such as wind and solar.

Visual depiction of a Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) or Vehicle-Grid-Integration (VGI) network

Source: Willett Kempton

What are the benefits of V2G integration?

A transition to V2G could enable vehicles to simultaneously improve the efficiency (and profitability) of electricity grids, reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transport, accommodate low-carbon sources of energy, and reap cost savings for vehicle owners, drivers, and other users.

The four main benefits of V2G integration are:

  • Turning unused equipment into useful services to the grid

A typical vehicle is on the road only 4–5% of the day, so 95% of the time, personal vehicles sit unused in parking lots or garages, typically near a building with electrical power.[1]

  • Using underutilised utility resources

Many utility resources go underused, which is an implication of the requirement that electricity generation and transmission capacity must be sufficient to meet the highest expected demand for power at any time. One study estimates that as of 2007, 84% of all light duty vehicles, if they were suddenly converted into plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) in the United States, could be supported by the existing electric infrastructure if they drew power from the grid at off-peak times[2].

  • Financial and economic benefits

Automobiles in a VGI configuration could provide additional revenue to owners that wish to sell power or grid services back to electric utilities.  Some studies suggest that some types of vehicle fleets could earn even more revenue than passenger vehicles, especially fleets with predictable driving patterns.[3]

  • Reduced air pollution and climate change, and increased integration and penetration of renewable sources of energy. PNNL projected that pollution from total volatile organic compounds and carbon monoxide emissions would decrease by 93% and 98%, respectively, under a scenario of VGI penetration and total NOx emissions would also be reduced by 31%. [4]  A VGI system can further accrue environmental benefits by providing storage support for intermittent renewable-energy generators.[5]

The unexplored questions

The vast majority of studies looking at VGI simply assume that consumers will go along and behave as the system tells them to. We need to better understand people, what cars they want to buy, and what it would take for them to be comfortable in letting someone else control the charging of their electric vehicle.

Furthermore, we need to understand how the societal benefits of the technology are distributed, especially among vulnerable groups. A transition to low carbon mobility needs to be just and equitable too.

V2G clearly has the potential to provide a wide variety of benefits to society.  However, research needs to broaden its focus and consider the following aspects:

  • Environmental performance of V2G in particular, rather than electric vehicles more generally;
  • Financing and business models, especially for new actors such as aggregators who may sit between vehicle owners and electric utilities;
  • User behavior, especially differing classes of those who may want to adopt electric vehicles and offer V2G services, and those who may not;
  • Natural resource use, including rare earth minerals and toxics needed for batteries and lifecycle components;
  • Visions and narratives, in particular cycles of hype and disappointment;
  • Social justice concerns, notably those cutting across vulnerable groups;
  • Gender norms and practices; and
  • Urban resilience in the face of intensifying climate change and consequent natural disasters.

Although the optimal mix is hard to discern, the share of V2G and VGI studies that focus on technical matters and rely on technical methods seems too large and imbalanced—as demonstrated by the many socially relevant research questions that remain unexplored.

Ultimately, these gaps in research need to be addressed to achieve the societal transition V2G advocates hope for.

 

Further reading:

This blog is based on two studies – “The Future Promise of Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) Integration: A Sociotechnical Review and Research Agenda” and “The neglected social dimensions to a vehicle-to-grid (V2G) transition: A critical and systematic review”—are available in the October Volume of Annual Review of Environment and Resources and Environmental Research Letters.

Read more about CIED’s research on urban transport and smart freight mobility.

Citations:

Sovacool, BK, L Noel, J Axsen, and W Kempton. “The neglected social dimensions to a vehicle-to-grid (V2G) transition: A critical and systematic review,” Environmental Research Letters 13(1) (January, 2018), 013001, pp. 1-18.

Sovacool, BK, J Axsen, and W Kempton. “The Future Promise of Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) Integration: A Sociotechnical Review and Research Agenda,” Annual Review of Environment and Resources 42 (October, 2017), pp. 377-406.

References:

[1] G. Pasaoglu et al., Travel patterns and the potential use of electric cars – Results from a direct survey in six European countries, Technological Forecasting & Social Change Volume 87, September 2014, Pages 51–59

[2] Michael K. Hidrue, George R. Parsons, Is there a near-term market for vehicle-to-grid electric vehicles?, Applied Energy 151 (2015) 67–76

[3] Michael K. Hidrue, George R. Parsons, Is there a near-term market for vehicle-to-grid electric vehicles?, Applied Energy 151 (2015) 67–76

[4] Kintner-Meyer, Michael, Kevin Schneider, and Robert Pratt. 2007. “Impacts Assessment of Plug-In Hybrid Vehicles on Electric Utilities and Regional U.S. Power Grids Part 1: Technical Analysis,” Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Report, available at http://www.pnl.gov/energy/eed/etd/pdfs/phev_feasibility_analysis_combined.pdf.

[5] Okan Arslan, Oya Ekin Karasan, Cost and emission impacts of virtual power plant formation in plug-in hybrid electric vehicle penetrated networks, Energy 60 (2013) 116-124