Rezachek & Associates'
Energy & Environmental Resources

Energy Economics/Environmental Economics

General - Page 2

How Much Does Electricity from Wind Turbines Cost? The dramatic rises in the price of oil that took place in 1973 and 1978 sent shock waves through the world's energy markets. Since then, however, oil prices have gradually declined, in fits and starts, to levels far below their late-1970s peak in real terms. These price fluctuations have created a very difficult environment for new technologies such as wind that are attempting to enter the commercial marketplace. Nevertheless, wind energy costs have declined steadily and substantially since 1980, and further declines that will make wind broadly cost-competitive with other energy sources are now projected.

IDEAS IDEAS is a new service providing information about working papers to the economics profession. IDEAS stands for "Internet Documents in Economics Access Service", which is not very good English, but you get the idea... It is run with considerable help from others by Christian Zimmermann, member of the Center for Research on Economic Fluctuations and Employment (CREFE) at the University of Quebec at Montreal.

International Association for Energy Economics (IAEE) IAEE founded in 1977, provides a forum for the exchange of ideas, experience and issues among professionals interested in energy economics. Its scope is worldwide, as are its members, who come from diverse backgrounds -- corporate, academic, scientific and government.

Internet Resources for Economics ... Listings in areas related to economics, with emphasis on environmental, natural resources, and ecological economics, as well as sites entirely dedicated to the environment, economics, ecology, natural resources management, "green" markets, etc.

Journal of Environmental Economics and Management The Journal of Environmental Economics and Management is devoted to the publication of theoretical and empirical papers concerned with the linkage between economic systems and environmental and natural resources systems. Generally regarded as the top journal in natural resources and environmental economics, it concentrates on the management and/or social control of the economy in its relationship with the management and use of natural resources and the natural environment. Providing worldwide coverage of the field, the Journal includes articles by economists as well as interdisciplinary papers by researchers in other fields of interest to resource and environmental economists.

Measuring Project Profitability The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Green Lights program suggests the IRR method as a profitability measure for evaluating lighting improvements. IRR is a simple and accurate test, expressed in percentage terms, that takes into account the immediate costs, savings after the payback period, and the time value of money or the present value of future cash flows. EPA rejected other cost-benefit methodologies, such as payback period, return on investment, and net present value, because IRR is a more accurate tool. For example, IRR accounts for long term savings, does not overestimate savings, and calculates the true cost of energy efficiency investments. A drawback of IRR is that it does not take into consideration the size or scope of projects.

National Economic, Social, and Environmental Data Bank / NESE DB The National Economic, Social, and Environmental Data Bank (NESE DB) is a collection of the most recent and comprehensive information on important issues in the United States. This databank comprises over 65,000 documents, spreadsheets, diagrams, tables, and time series.

Policy and Economics Reports by Shimon Awerbuch

RECLAIM RECLAIM is a revolutionary new approach to air quality regulation. This program has the potential to clean up our air more effectively than traditional regulations by harnessing the power of the marketplace. For businesses, RECLAIM means greater flexibility and a financial incentive to reduce air pollution beyond what clean air laws and traditional command-and-control rules require. For the public, RECLAIM means guaranteed annual reductions in air pollution until public health standards are achieved.

References for Natural Resource and Environmental Economics Links to references on such topics as: Alternative energy strategies; Recycling; Sustainable development; Generalised resource scarcity; Theory of pollution and externalities; Tradeable permits and taxes; Greenhouse gases; Water quality; and Environment valuation.

Resources for Economists on the Internet A large (310K) guide that lists the many resources on the Internet of interest to academic and practicing economists, and those interested in economics. A separate table of contents is available.

Selling Energy Services, Not Just Electricity: Towards a Tertiarization of EU Electricity Utilities There is a widely held belief which asserts that services offer more opportunities for growth than manufacturing, product-based industries. The electric power sector traditionally envisaged as a commodity-delivering industry has been slower in changing towards a service-based business than other sectors (eg. telecommunications). An interesting fact that may directly affect electric utilities in the near future is that new technologies (in particular non-energy technologies) will catalyse and accelerate this change. Besides this, within the frame of increasingly competitive electricity markets, utilities will need to aim at satisfying customers expectations by improving the trade-off between the economics of generation-transmission/distribution and quality of service of the end-use energy system, regardless of the effect on the economics of central power stations. The expected change will concern especially the ability to differentiate electricity products and to provide customers with a variety of additional services around the core product.

SO2 Emissions Trading Program The innovative, market-based SO2 allowance trading component of the Acid Rain Program allows utilities to adopt the most cost-effective strategy to reduce SO2 emissions at units in their systems. The Acid Rain Program operating permit outlines the specific program requirements and compliance options chosen by each source. Affected utilities are also required to install systems that continuously monitor emissions of SO2, NOx, and other related pollutants in order to track progress, ensure compliance, and provide credibility to the trading component of the program. In any year that compliance is not achieved, excess emissions penalties will apply, and sources either will have allowances deducted immediately from their accounts or may submit a plan to EPA that specifies how the excess SO2 emissions will be offset.

U.S. EPA Pay-As-You-Throw Online Pay-as-you-throw (PAYT) can help communities to manage solid waste in a way that is fair, economically sound, and environmentally sustainable.

Wind Energy Economics Annual electricity production will vary enormously depending on the amount of wind on your turbine site. Therefore, there is not a single price for wind energy, but a range of prices, depending on wind speeds.