Rezachek & Associates'
Energy & Environmental Resources

Utility Integration of Renewables

Barriers to Development

Barriers to Renewable Energy Utility deregulation is currently the biggest issue facing renewable energy. While in theory, deregulation could provide lower cost power and greater economic efficiency, it could also neglect the social and environmental issues that are tightly wound up with electricity use and production. UCS is busy fighting for a transition that preserves the social benefits of renewables while allowing for improvements in economic efficiency. The renewables portfolio standard and systems benefit charges are two approaches UCS supports for deregulation.

Barriers to Renewable Energy in Competitive Markets Electric utility restructuring can provide new opportunities for renewables and other clean energy resources. Surveys, focus groups, market simulations, and utility "green-pricing programs" have all found that, given the opportunity, some utility customers will purchase renewable power, even if it costs somewhat more than conventional power. But both economic theory and experience point to significant market barriers and market failures that will preclude the development of the economically efficient level of renewables without special policy measures.

Biomass Power Commercialization: The Federal Role (Part 2) Today’s biomass energy industry is a fragmented agglomeration of biomass fuel suppliers, conversion technology manufacturers, and utility, industry, commercial, and residential consumers. This situation reflects the heterogeneous nature of biomass feedstocks and the multiple end-uses for biomass: electricity generation, industrial and commercial heating, production of liquid transportation fuels, and more. Significant challenges remain in bringing biomass to full commercialization potential, as each link in the biomass energy cycle—fuel production, delivery, and utilization for energy—must be developed concurrently with the other components.

Commercialization Barriers to Renewable Energy Renewables and some demand-side management technologies must overcome three commercialization barriers if they are to compete against mature fossil fuel and nuclear technologies: undeveloped infrastructure, lack of economies of scale, and unequal federal subsidies.

Geothermal - Barriers to Development A brief article about barriers to geothermal development.

Greenpeace: Remove Barriers to Clean Energy There is evidence that many clean and efficient energy investments would reduce energy costs now, but are not being implemented, says Greenpeace. This is because the energy "playing field" is steeply angled against clean and efficient energy. Structural, policy and price reforms are necessary to allow Australia to meet its emissions reduction target. While such reforms might eventually cause job losses in some areas, investment in clean and efficient technology would actually generate jobs in others. According to atmosphere and energy campaigner Keith Tarlow, energy reforms are not only environmentally necessary, but could bring economic benefits in the long term.

Reducing Market Barriers to Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Climate-change mitigation requires expansion of global markets for commercially attractive energy-efficiency and renewable energy-technologies. But many "market barriers" inhibit these markets from developing as quickly or as completely as the economic opportunities would suggest. Recently, concern about climate change has driven market-building activities by bilateral and multilateral agencies. For example, Global Environment Facility (GEF) resources devoted to "market-barrier reduction" projects to mitigate climate change will amount to hundreds of millions of dollars.

SEI-B Climate-Change Mitigation Research: Reducing Market Barriers to Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Climate-change mitigation requires expansion of global markets for commercially attractive energy-efficiency and renewable energy-technologies. But many "market barriers" inhibit these markets from developing as quickly or as completely as the economic opportunities would suggest. Recently, concern about climate change has driven market-building activities by bilateral and multilateral agencies. For example, Global Environment Facility (GEF) resources devoted to "market-barrier reduction" projects to mitigate climate change will amount to hundreds of millions of dollars.

Siting and Permitting Renewable energy projects are often modest in scale compared with conventional power plants, and may be developed by small businesses. If a state's energy facility siting/permitting process involves more than one agency, it is likely to pose a serious institutional barrier to renewable energy development. A streamlined siting/permitting process reduces transaction costs imposed on the developer, ratepayers, and society. Establishing a fixed time limit for decision-making limits one of the key risks for investors in a wind project -- the risk of a long or unpredictable regulatory lead time for project approval.

Solar - Market Barriers and Niches

Understanding the Barriers to Renewable Energy Technologies in Africa Africa has substantial new and renewable energy resources, with more than 1.1 million GW of exploitable hydropower capacity, more than 9,000 MW of geothermal potential, abundant biomass potential, substantial solar potential, and in some countries, significant wind potential. In contrast to fossil fuel reserves which are potentially major sources of harmful local and global emissions that tend to be concentrated to a few countries, renewable sources of energy are not only environmentally-benign but are better distributed throughout the continent.

Wind - Barriers to Development A brief summary on the constraints on integration of wind energy into electric utility systems.