Diffusion der Biogastechnologie in der Schweiz: eine GIS-basierte Multiagenten-Simulation

In this article we introduce a GIS-based multi-agent simulation model. It is used to study the spatial diffusion dynamics of agricultural biogas plants in Switzerland, which lags markedly behind those in the neighboring countries Austria and Germany. The investigation concentrates in particular on the impacts of economic factors and of locally available resources on the diffusion process. The model considers three different types of plants (100 kW_el, 200 kW_el, 1 MW_el). The results show that feed-in tariffs, cosubstrate prices and the revenues from heat sales are critical parameters. They indicate further that the present promotion policy fosters smaller plants, whereas larger plants are preferred only in few areas with high substrate densities. Finally, we find evidence that increased heat sales can significantly raise diffusion dynamics, and that the higher feed-in tariffs planned in Switzerland could actually overcompensate deteriorating cosubstrate prices.     

Die Verteilung der Kosten des Ausbaus der Erneuerbaren

Germany’s private and industrial consumers have to bear electricity prices that are among the highest in Europe, a major reason being the massive subsidization of green electricity via feed-in tariffs. To dampen future electricity cost increases, numerous suggestions were published recently. They differ substantially with respect to their distributional impacts, transaction costs, political feasibility, and their impact on the cost-effectiveness of the future promotion of renewable technologies. This article’s qualitative evaluation of the most prominent proposals indicates that, more or less, they all fall short with respect to these evaluation criteria. In conclusion, decision-makers would be well advised to reconsider Germany’s renewable energy goals. Consideration should be given to either abolishing these ambitious goals or to improving the cost-effectiveness of the future expansion of renewable energy technologies to dampen the likely continued increase in electricity prices.     

Status und Herausforderungen der Energieversorgung der EU-28

The current crisis in the Ukraine, the promotion of renewables and climate change have caused the issue of energy supply to come to the fore in the media. In designing the European energy supply it is essential that three energy policy objectives be pursued: competitive strength, security of supply and environmental compatibility. At the end of the past decade, the European Union set the so-called 20-20-20 targets, to be reached by the year 2020. The first specified objective is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20?% compared with 1990 levels, the second to expand the share of renewables in final energy consumption to 20?%, and the third is to improve energy efficiency by 20?% by the year 2020. The achievement of these targets is tied to the situation in the member states, which varies considerably. Resources and—as a result—the energy mix, the states’ economic development and the various governments’ alignment of energy policy are very different. The amount of energy consumed varies significantly depending on the size of the country in question, population density, economic performance and industrial structure as well as climatic conditions. But the energy mix and import dependency, in particular the dependency on Russian natural gas under discussion in the current situation, also differ considerably in the various EU-28 countries. The EU is facing the special challenge of taking account of the country-specific circumstances while dealing with the impact of climate change, growing import dependency, and the world’s rising demand for energy as well as the associated, ever-increasing competition on the commodity markets. This requires that the EU consider all energy and technology options and strive to establish a common EU energy space.     

Strommarktdesign: Zur Ausgestaltung der Auktionsregeln an der EEX

This paper studies the design of power exchanges in liberalized electricty markets. We analyze several pricing rules for day ahead trading and show that a uniform price mechanism has quite desirable properties as compared to its alternatives. We then discuss how the particular cost structure of electricity generation can be accounted for by appropriate bid formats. We moreover analyze the effects of bid caps and price floors in electricity auctions on market performance, as well as several other aspects of electricity market design. In particular, we discuss linkage of independently operating markets for electricity, reserve energy and transmission capacities, coupling of national power exchanges, and the effects of transparency on the outcome of electricity markets.     

Die Marktabgrenzung in der Elektrizitätswirtschaft

This article presents the current market definition in the electricity sector as applied by the Bundeskartellamt (Federal Cartel Office). The main focus is on the definition of the relevant product and geographic markets at the end consumer level. Moreover, it considers implications of the market definition for competition policy. A central aspect of the electricity sector is the interdependence between the generation, distribution and end consumer levels. It follows that the generation level has a deterministic impact on the electricity sector in general and especially at the consumer level.     

Kundenportale in der Energiebranche: Bestandsaufnahme und Entwicklungspotenziale

Since the energy market had been liberalized, the competition between utilities has increased. In order to win new and hold existing customers, it seems necessary to develop new services and products that closely meet the needs of the customers. An online-portal can be such a service, as it will serve as a central interface between utility and customer when the personal contact diminishes due to a decreasing local focus of the utility and the omission of the meter reading at the customer’s house caused by Smart Metering. In this article, the major criteria for the development of such a portal will be introduced. A market survey shows which criteria are already considered and which design criteria are not taken into account yet. This article focuses psychological concepts that motivate customers to use the portal regularly and save energy. We conclude that there is much room for improvement with regard to the criteria that are meant to illustrate the energy consumption and with regard to the provision of psychological incentives.     

Rekommunalisierung versus Neukonzessionierung der Energieversorgung

The current trend back to municipal utilities (??remunicipalisation??) in the German energy system shows very different approaches and variants in the real cases. Converting the distribution network from privately-owned distribution companies to municipally-owned entities often forms the starting point of such restructuring processes. Ecological or regional development motivations are at the forefront of public debates. The authors emphasize the importance of energy economic aspects of this problem. Advantages and disadvantages of remunicipalisation projects depend strongly on the specific regional circumstances. Important factors are the potentials for cooperation and expansion of the business activities. Moreover, the price which has to be paid for taking over the network infrastructure has to be taken into account as the decisive parameter: The price for buying or renting the network and the possible revenues on the backdrop of incentive-based regulation define the economic viability for the municipality. Many of the often heard arguments pro remunicipalisation, such as the objective of decentralized energy supply, labour effects and municipal contributions to climate protection, do not fully convince in the end; as well the fiscal status of many municipalities in Germany is severe. Nonetheless remunicipalisation must not be rejected in general because there is no general proof for welfare losses resulting from these projects. In fact, it depends mainly on local influencing factors to what extent municipalities should be or become active in the field of energy supply. Among the most important aspects the preferences of the citizens, the environmental and political aims of the municipality (so far they are defined) and the available resources of the municipal decision making persons and bodies must be mentioned. However, in economic terms the leeway for the municipality remains restricted by the costs of operating the network and tariff regulation.     

Analyse der Marktaussichten von Biogasanlagen

Without guaranteed compensation, granted by the German Renewable Energy Sources Act (Erneuerbare Energien Gesetz/EEG), biogas plants compete with all other plant types on the market for electrical energy. However, exchange-based electricity products do not currently permit an economically viable operation of biogas plants owing to their cost situation.     

Ein Rollenmodell zur Einbindung der Endkunden in eine smarte Energiewelt

The successful expansion of renewable energies requires a phase of change in the energy supply system. On the one hand solutions have to be found to ensure the system dependability in spite of the high volatility of the feeding-in from renewable sources. On the other hand the differences between feeding-in and demand, which also occurs on the regional level evermore, have to be equalized on the regional level, too. For this purpose, it is necessary to develop new control and modified market mechanisms. The role definition of the involved actors gets an increasing relevance because of the politically predetermined unbundling. However, only a slight attention was paid to the role of the final consumers in the past. For a successful rebuilding of the energy supply system it is nevertheless important to involve the consumers in this process. It could be demonstrated within the research project “MeRegio”, that the integration of the consumers into an incentive based demand side management can tap significant potentials to equalize differences between feeding-in and demand. Therefore, the focusing on the final consumers can have an important contribution to rebuild the energy supply system.     

Rolle der Kohle im weltweiten Energiemix

In the past decade, coal was the energy resource boasting the strongest absolute growth world-wide. Most of the coal is used in the countries where it is extracted and 15% of coal production is traded on international markets. With a share of 41% coal is the No. 1 fuel source in global power generation. The benefits offered by coal are security of supply and lower prices than that of rival energy carriers. In the main scenario of the 2010 World Energy Outlook, the International Energy Agency assumes that until 2035 coal will have to make a growing absolute contribution to the 75% increase in global power generation. According to this assumption, coal, accounting for 32%, will make the same contribution as renewable resources in 2035.     

Eine Bewertung der Regelenergievermarktung im Power-to-Gas-Konzept

The integration of the increasing share of fluctuating renewable energy sources into the energy system requires more options in flexibility. A promising attempt is the power-to-gas concept (PtG) which allows the production of hydrogen and synthetic natural gas (SNG) from electricity and the storage in caverns or existing gas storage facilities. However, an economic operation in Germany is not expected before 2030, when the amount of surplus energy, mainly generated in wind parks, will be sufficient. Currently, a hardly analyzed aspect is the potential commercialization of the flexible electrolysis as controllable load on the electricity balancing market. This offers opportunities to generate additional revenues and to obtain cheap electricity in the form of balancing energy. The present article has been designed to analyze this aspect and to examine the impact of a potential commercialization of balancing energy on the gas production costs within the PtG concept. At first, the current legal framework, the funding instruments of SNG and the differences between the notion ‘Speichergas’ and ‘Biogas’ will be outlined. An overview of the current balancing market will be given and the development of prices on the secondary balancing market will be evaluated as well as expected market trends will be presented. The following calculation of gas production costs, which result from applying an optimal proposal strategy on the secondary balancing market, is model-based and uses historical data. Three scenarios are defined and examined, and the impact of variable electricity prices is analyzed. The electricity balancing market is profitable and offers many opportunities for PtG plants. The results show a decrease of SNG production costs by up to 74 % to 46,9 €/MWh. As for the hydrogen, the production costs amount to approximately 25,8 €/MWh which equals a cost reduction of up to 81 % compared to conventional PtG plants without commercialization of balancing energy.     

Negative Strompreise und der Vorrang Erneuerbarer Energien

With the appearance of negative prices a discussion about flaws in the design of the German electricity market arose. We show that negative prices are not only due to the integration of electricity from renewable energy sources. Negative prices can actually increase welfare. Yet, a loss of welfare does arise because of the priority feed-in of these sources. They are inclined to deliver energy even when the cost of production exceeds the market price, i.e. the electricity’s value. We suggest to remove the priority feed-in combined with a modification of the feed-in tariffs. Thereby, renewable electricity producers will suffer no drawbacks but social welfare increases.     

Status,Daten und Entwicklungen der globalen Energieversorgung

Global energy consumption is growing. The growth in energy consumption is now covered roughly equally by renewable energy resources and fossil energy resources. Nevertheless, crude oil, natural gas and coal continue to form the backbone of energy supplies. This means that the dependency of energy supplies on fossil energy resources will continue for the foreseeable future. In Germany as well, there is no end in sight of the country decreasing its high dependency on imports of fossil energy resources despite the high growth rate of renewables—and due in part to the decline in domestic production and the withdrawal from nuclear power generation. Crude oil, natural gas, hard coal and lignite with a share of around 80%, still make the largest contribution to the German and global primary energy consumption.All of the renewables together cover around 17% of global energy consumption. Despite the almost inexhaustible potential, making energy generation from renewable sources available at a large scale and commensurate with demand is still in its infancy. By way of contrast, very large reserves of fossil energy resources have already been developed for many years, and are being used in growing quantities. The global comparison of already produced and therefore consumed energy resources and the still existing reserves and resources, reveal that large non-depleted energy potential still exists in all regions around the world. Whilst the potential hardly appears to be touched in Austral-Asia, in the CIS and North America, only a small portion has been produced to date even in Europe. This wealth in resources is primarily attributable to the large deposits of coal found on all continents, which, unlike conventional crude oil and natural gas, are not restricted to a few special regions. Although the Middle East is an extremely important region for crude oil and natural gas, the minor coal reserves in the area mean that its overall potential is comparatively small.     

Eine Konzeption zum Regulierungsmanagement im Kontext der Anreizregulierung

Strategic decisions of network operators are directly and indirectly affected by the current regulatory environment. Representing an important political and legal influence factor, the regulatory environment must be taken into account in the strategic decision-making process. Dealing with this factor is essential for an unbundled network operator, who’s main source of income is its grid access fee. Therefore, a comprehensive evaluation of the regulatory environment is indispensable for the success of network operators. This task should be handled by a department for regulatory management. However, as regulatory management is not clearly defined in business research, the present article intends to close this gap and develop a design for implementing a department for regulatory management. Our findings contribute to a better understanding of managerial behaviour under regulatory constraints. As part of our design, environmental analysis serves as an example to point out the specific challenges in regulated markets.     

Eigentumsentflechtung,deep-ISO,der dritte Weg — wohin führt die Reise der Europäischen Energiemärkte?

This paper discusses vertical unbundling of networks from the commercial businesses in the European energy markets. The current status quo in the political field in Brussels is to implement a choice between three options: ownership unbundling, the “deep-ISO”, the “third way”. The “third way” is the strengthening of the current unbundling regulations, but will change hardly anything in the industry structure. The “deep-ISO” requires the separation of system operations into an independent entity, whereas transmission ownership does not change hands and thus possibly remains in one hand with the power plants. If the ISO decides and orders network investment, we speak of a “deep-ISO”. The more controversial proposal is ownership unbundling. A social-cost-benefit-analysis of the German transmission system operators (Brunekreeft, 2008) suggests that the likely overall effect for social welfare is slightly positive, but effects are small.     

Energieversorgung als Innovationsbranche vor dem Hintergrund der Energiewende: Ein Fragezeichen

The energy transition includes some technical challenges for the economy. A long-term increase in the demand for energy must be met, whereas proven technologies are no longer opportune. This requires a huge amount of research and development. Is the energy industry facing this challenge? To what extent the additional R & D need is reflected in the official statistics?     

Einfluss der CO2-Zertifikatspreise auf die Stromgestehungskosten im deutschen Energiemix

In the past, electricity generation costs in Germany’s energy mix depended for the most part on the development of fossil fuel prices. Despite the strongly increasing share of renewable energies in the energy mix, the generation of electricity from fossil fuel power plants, especially brown and bituminous coal power plants, still dominates in Germany today. Alongside fossil fuels as an increasing cost factor, the price of CO₂ is also gaining importance as a price factor in the production of electricity from fossil fuel power plants. The establishment of the European Emission Trading Scheme (EU ETS) in 2005 formed the basis of CO₂ emissions pricing, and was oriented on the emission reduction targets of the European Union. Although the price of CO₂-certificates in free trade is shown on several stock exchanges, the CO₂ price is still policy driven. The amount of free allocated and traded CO₂-certificates is set on a European policy level. Current decisions on temporary limitations of the trade volume have corresponding effects on exchange prices. This article aims to investigate the impact of CO₂-certificate prices on electricity generation costs in the German energy mix. Comparing real CO₂ prices to forecasts for 2013 provides findings on the effects that the political decisions of the European Parliament with regard to the limitation of the trade volume of available CO₂-certificates have on electricity generation costs in the German energy mix.     

Kurzevaluation des Energie- und Klimapakets der EU-Kommission vom 23. Januar 2008

The main features of the European Commission’s “Climate Action and Renewable Energy Package” from January 23rd, 2008, have been implemented in the GINFORS model. In 2007 various alternative paths for achieving the EU’s climate targets were analysed on behalf of the German Federal Ministry of Economy and Technology (BMWi) using GINFORS. The results basically point in the same direction as those found by the model-based Impact Assessment put out by the European Commission. The macro-economic costs of the package are below 1 % of the EU’s annual GDP. In particular the new member states will be affected above average, which justifies redistribution mechanisms. The yearly growth rates though will remain almost unchanged until 2020. The disproportionately high reduction targets for the ETS sector cannot be reproduced by GINFORS. They cause higher macro-economic costs than necessary. Altogether this does not yet result in a coherent traceable overall picture of the EU package, especially in comparison to analyses of the German energy and climate change policy.