Abstract: This paper looks at the status and prospects of renewables—with particular emphasis on windpower—in the electric power sector. Although renewables account for a steadily rising share of electricity generation in various countries, their role remains small in absolute terms. In part, this is because of technological progress of and successful competition from fossil-fueled generation—notably, combined cycle gas turbines. While diminishing, subsidies continue to be indispensable to the use of renewables in most places. Viability of renewables-based electricity is undermined by the cost of externalities for which fossil energy combustion is only partially charged. A number of countries (and states in the U.S.) have launched obligatory requirements for renewables-based electricity in the years ahead. This so-called “renewable portfolio standard,” while technology-forcing, offers an opportunity for an economically efficient way of promoting greater market penetration of renewables.

Abstract: This paper first describes trends and future predictions of factors that determine U.S. dependence on oil and oil imports. We then review evidence on the oil premium, that is, the extent to which the costs to the United States as a whole from extra oil consumption may exceed the private costs to individual oil users. The premium has two main components: one reflects the risk of macroeconomic disruptions from oil price shocks, while the other stems from U.S. market power in the world oil market. Our best assessment of the oil premium is $5/barrel (equivalent to 12 cents per gallon of gasoline), which would warrant a broad, though moderately scaled, tax on all uses of oil.

Abstract:

In this paper we develop a cost index–based measure of the expected consumer welfare gains from innovation in electricity generation technologies. To illustrate our approach, we estimate how much better off consumers would be from 2000 to 2020 as renewable energy technologies continue to be improved and gradually adopted, compared with a counterfactual scenario that allows for continual improvement of conventional technology. We proceed from the position that the role and prospects of renewable energy are best assessed within a market setting that considers competing energy technologies and sources. We evaluate five renewable energy technologies used to generate electricity: solar photovoltaics, solar thermal, geothermal, wind, and biomass. For each, we assume an accelerated adoption rate due to technological advances, and we evaluate the benefits against a baseline technology, combined-cycle gas turbine, which experts cite as the conventional technology most likely to be installed as incremental capacity over the next decade. We evaluate benefits against both the conventional combined-cycle gas turbine prevalent at this time and a more advanced combined-cycle gas turbine expected to be employed during the coming decade. We estimate the model for two geographic regions of the nation for which renewable energy is, or can be expected to be, a somewhat sizable portion of the electricity market—California and the north central United States.

In present-value terms we find that median consumer welfare gains over 20 years vary markedly among the renewable technologies, ranging from large negative values (welfare losses) to large positive values (welfare gains). The effect of uncertainty can lead to estimates that are 20% to 40% larger or smaller than median predicted values. Our results suggest that portfolios that give equal weight to the use of each generation technology are likely to lead to consumer losses in our regions, regardless of the role of the externalities that we consider. However, when the portfolio is more heavily weighted toward certain renewables, consumer gains can be positive.

Abstract: Satellite solar power (SSP) has been suggested as an alternative to terrestrial energy resources for electricity generation. In this study, we consider the market for electricity from the present to 2020, roughly the year when many experts expect SSP to be technically achievable. We identify several key challenges for SSP in competing with conventional electricity generation in developed and developing countries, discuss the role of market and economic analysis as technical development of SSP continues during the coming years, and suggest future research directions to improve understanding of the potential economic viability of SSP.

Abstract: This study provides an evaluation of the performance of five renewable energy technologies used to generate electricity: biomass, geothermal, solar photovoltaics, solar thermal, and wind. The authors compared the actual performance of these technologies against stated projections that helped shape public policy goals over the last three decades. Their findings document a significant difference between the success of renewable technologies in penetrating the U.S. electricity generation market and in meeting cost-related goals, when compared with historic projections. In general, renewable technologies have failed to meet expectations with respect to market penetration. They have succeeded, however, in meeting or exceeding expectations with respect to their cost. To a significant degree, the difference in performance in meeting projections of penetration and cost stem from the declining price of conventional generation, which constitutes a moving baseline against which renewable technologies have had to compete.

Abstract: Labor productivity in U.S. coal mining increased at an average annual rate of slightly over four percent during the past 45 years. This report examines key factors contributing to that record - particularly, technological innovation in both surface and underground mining and concurrent geographic shifts in U.S. coal production. Health, safety, and environmental regulations introduced in the sixties and seventies, as well as labor unrest, interrupted long-term productivity advance; but the interruption was of limited duration. Although our principal focus is on worker productivity, steady growth in the relative importance of non-labor inputs underscores the need to consider total factor productivity. The report touches on the productivity record using that measure.