Integration erneuerbarer Energien in die deutsche Stromversorgung im Zeitraum 2015�C2020 mit Ausblick auf 2025

The dena grid study II examines the integration of renewable energies into Germany??s electricity supply up to the year 2020 and gives a qualified outlook up to 2025. The study develops geographically differentiated scenarios for installed wind power capacity, on the basis of which time series of the wind power feed-in into high and extra high voltage nodes and offshore wind farms are generated. Future requirements for the transmission grid and grid extension options are analysed. Opportunities to introduce more flexibility in the power system in terms of supply and demand are examined. The study gives a conceptual perspective of the need for grid extension in inner Germany in order to fully integrate renewable energies, whilst operating power stations at optimum cost and exchanging electricity with other countries in response to market demands within the scope of the specified transmission capacities.     

Staat versus Markt: Konsumentenpräferenzen und die Förderung erneuerbarer Energien

This paper presents a set of artefacutal field experiments on individual preferences and willingness to pay, respectively, for the consumption of green electricity. Based on an economic model of individual preferences for the provision of public goods, the design of our experiments involved different scenarios: subjects had to decide about their individual spending on green electricity as well as about the level of public subsidies for green electricity. Unlike hypothetical empirical methods, the experiments involved an incentive mechanism, i.e. subjects had to face the monetary consequences of their decisions. Our empirical results are distinct from those of other studies. It seems that the market potential of green electricity is overestimated at present. Hence, the market will not release the public in financing subsidies in this field. The conclusion can be drawn that individuals prefer binding collective contributions rather than individual market-driven activities. However, we contradict the standard explanation of political economy that such a kind of preference for regulatory instruments may be motivated by cost-illusion. Subjects were willing to bear far higher taxes as compared to the price mark-up they were willing to pay for green electricity offered by the market.     

Die Marktprämie im EEG 2012: Ein sinnvoller Beitrag zur Markt- und Systemintegration erneuerbarer Energien?

With the share of renewable energies within the electricty sector rising, improving their market integration (i.e. inclusion in the steering and remuneration processes of the electricity market) and system integration (i.e. enhanced responsibility for grid stability) is of increasing importance. To transform the energy system efficiently while ensuring security of supply, it is necessary to increase the alignment of renewable electricity production with short- and long-term market signals. The German Renewable Energy Sources Act 2012 introduced the market premium to provide market experience to renewable plant operators and incentives for demand-oriented electricity production. Shortly after its introduction, the instrument is already being criticised as ineffective and expensive. Building on early experiences, this article examines whether the market premium in its current design improves market and/or system integration, and if it seems suitable in principle to contribute to these aims (effectiveness). Also, potential efficiency gains and additional costs of “administering integration” are discussed (efficiency). While market integration in a strict sense (i.e. exposing renewables to price risks) is not the purpose of the market premium, it has successfully increased participation in direct marketing. However, windfall profits are high, and the benefits of gradually leading plant operators towards the market are questionable. Incentives for demand-oriented electricity production are established, but they prove insufficient particularly in the case of intermittent renewable energy sources. A continuation of the instrument in its current form therefore does not seem recommendable. To conclude, potential alternative solutions are presented.     

Elektroautos in einer von erneuerbaren Energien geprägten Energiewirtschaft

The German Federal Government wants to establish Germany as a leading market for electric mobility. Potential environmental benefits and changes in the economic framework conditions of the energy sector are described in this paper. In order to quantify the electricity split which is actually used for charging electric vehicles, two economic models for the energy sector, a model for the market penetration of electric vehicles, a vehicle model and an LCA model are brought together. Based on an assumed dynamic increase of electric vehicles to 12 million in 2030, an additional electricity demand of about 18 TWh is calculated. If the vehicles are charged directly after their last daily trip, the peak load increases by 12%—despite the small increase in electricity demand. First model calculations for the development of the European power generation system show that the direct impact on the construction of new power plants remains low even until 2030. An impact of electric mobility on CO₂ certificate prices can only be seen from 2025 onwards and is limited to an increase in certificate prices by a maximum of 8 % in 2030. An optimisation is possible with intelligent charging strategies: The peak load without demand side management can be reduced by 5 GW and about 600 GWh of additional wind energy can used which would otherwise have been throttled due to feed-in management—about 3.5 % of the total electricity demand of electric vehicles. On the other hand, demand side management leads to more coal power plants instead of gas power plants being used to meet the additional electricity demand. If additional renewable sources are installed along with demand side management, the electricity for electric vehicles is almost carbon free. This is also reflected in the life cycle balance of electric vehicles which also includes vehicle and battery production: With today’s average electricity split in Germany, the greenhouse gas emissions of electric vehicles are about comparable to vehicles with conventional combustion engines. However, the electricity split in 2030 or the use of additional renewable energy sources lead to a significant advantage in the greenhouse gas balance.     

Mögliche Entwicklung der Umlage zur Förderung der Stromerzeugung aus erneuerbaren Energien durch das Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz bis 2018

As a result of the strong growth of renewable energies in the German electricity sector within the last few years, the allocation of renewable costs to the consumer (RES-E apportionment) has been set to 5.277 ct/kWh for 2013 (ÜNB, Pressemitteilung der Übertragungsnetzbetreiber zur veröffentlichten EEG-Umlage 2013, 2012a). This article presents potential developments in the costs of promoting renewable energy and the RES-E apportionment in Germany using three different scenarios. Each of the scenarios considers different trends with respect to further deployment of renewable energies, wholesale prices and electricity demand. Due to the underlying uncertainties surrounding these major parameters, the scenarios show a wide range for the RES-E apportionment. A reduction of the RES-E apportionment can be reached if we consider an increase in wholesale prices. However, the scenarios indicate a further increase in the RES-E apportionment, where the amount heavily depends on the further deployment of renewable energies and the development of wholesale prices. Despite the reduction of feed-in tariffs, a main contributor to an increase in the RES-E apportionment is still the ongoing deployment of photovoltaics (PV). In order to prevent a further cost increase without inhibiting renewable targets, it may be worth focusing on comparably cheaper technologies in the further deployment of renewable energies.     

Versorgungsqualit?t in der leitungsgebundenen Gasversorgung

The incentive regulation ordinance (Anreizregulierungsverordnung (ARegV)) stipulates the implementation of a quality regulation scheme for the second regulatory period gas (2013?C2018). This raises the issue how to specify, define and stimulate quality specifically for gas transportation and distribution. According to §§18?C20 ARegV, the dimensions ??reliability?? and ??network capacity?? need to be incorporated. Due to the lack of tangibility of quality in the gas sector, the issue of quality turns out to be much more complex than in the electricity sector where quality or??more specifically??reliability is mainly associated with the premise ??keeping the lights on??. In order to establish a first idea of the current situation in the area of quality in grid-bound gas supply, WIK conducted expert interviews with different stakeholders from industry and science. Following this first step, a workshop took place to present the results from the survey and to further discuss the main issues. Overall, it turned out from the discussion that the definition and differentiation of the different quality dimensions is very complex due to the heterogeneous views of the stakeholders on priorities and incentives. Two different attitudes towards the regulation of the quality dimension reliability emerged in the interviews. One part of the group advocated the implementation of a corresponding q-element in the regulatory formula, whereas the other part preferred a quality monitoring without regulatory effects. Overall, the interviews and the workshop served its purpose in collecting the different opinions of the stakeholders. Based on these results, the discussion can be deepened. To approach the topic, it will be shown how the regulators in the Netherlands and Hungary converted the rarely practiced quality regulation into practice.     

Energiewende: Alles eine Frage der Partizipation? Governance-Herausforderungen zwischen Zentralität und Dezentralität

The interaction of centralised and decentralised elements is not only a challenge for the technical und functional implementation of the energy transition, but also for the political and social assignment of developing adequate governance strategies for future energy systems. While “participation” is of capital importance for all governance approaches mediating centralising and decentralising trends, it is far from clear, how participation is to be realized in order to promote energy transition and avoiding pitfalls and flaws of participative decision making processes. Against the backdrop of a multi-dimensional understanding of “participation” comprising procedural, factual, legitimatory and meta-reflective functions, the paper considers the tense relations of participation and efficiency, legitimacy and professionalized expertise, thereby identifying structural challenges for participation in democratic societies. Finally, some suggestions are made, how the governance of the energy transition can be shaped in the future.     

Regulierung, Effizienz und das Anreizdilemma bei Investitionen in intelligente Netze

In this paper, we survey from a theoretical point of view to what extend cost-based and incentive-based regulatory regimes stimulate investments. For the purpose of this analysis, we furthermore differentiate by different efficiency measures, i.e. allocative efficiency, productive efficiency and dynamic efficiency and analyse to what extend each efficiency measure is stimulated by the regulatory regime. Eventually, we analyse to what extend regulatory incentives for network innovation in a smart grid context exist and to what extend different forms of regulation stimulate dynamic efficiency.     

Energieeffizienznetzwerke – beschleunigte Emissionsminderungen in der mittelständischen Wirtschaft

The reduction of energy-related CO₂ emissions by more efficient enery use in medium sized companies is one of the most profitable options. However, these opportunities are scarcely realised because of many obstacles and market failures. High transaction cost and decision routines play an important role for decision making and procurement of the companies. A network concept being developed in Switzerland and covering an initial consulting of each participating company, targets for the network, regular and moderated meetings of the energy managers for mutual exchange of experiences and a yearly monitoring alleviates many of these obstacles. It doubles the energy efficiency progress relative to the average progress of industry. This network concept can be fully realised by industry itself. Average energy savings per site and year are 100,000 € and average CO₂ emission reduction about 500 t CO₂ per year and site. Assuming a maximum potential of 700 Networks, additional emission reductions of some 10 Mio. t CO₂ seem to be possible in Germany by 2020. A network management system for consulting engineers and moderators allows a minimum performance standard of how to start and operate those efficiency networks.     

Kurzfristige Kehrtwende bei der Beschaffung neu zu errichtender Anlagen für die Netzreserve in Deutschland

Shortly before the decision of the Electricity Market Law on June 22, 2016 took place, the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi) changed its mind with respect to the procurement of new power plants for the German grid reserve. Other than originally planned, this is no longer organized via a competitive bidding process. Instead, the responsibility for the procurement will be transferred to the transmission system operators, which therefore face the challenge of implementing an appropriate procurement mechanism. This paper presents an economic explanation for this short-term change. Our analysis reveals that the proposed transfer of the concept for the procurement of spare capacity to the procurement of the grid reserve was not appropriate. The bidders would have been exposed to significant risks, in particular due to high cost and calculation uncertainties, which are also critical with respect to the achievement of the objectives of the grid reserve. Therefore, we consider the decision of refusing the original procurement concept as the right step, although we consider a competitive procedure advantageous. However, such a procedure has to take the special requirements of the grid reserve into account. Yet this problem remains even after the transfer of responsibility from the BMWi to the transmission system operators.     

Handel mit Grünstromzertifikaten bei Existenz von Emissionszielen: Gewinner und Verlierer in der EU

Within the development goal for the use of renewable energies in the EU, after the publishing of the directive proposal from the European Commission on January 23, an intensive discussion is taking place as to if and how the trade of green electricity certificates should occur. A motion from the opposition in the Bundestag explicitly asks to favour the proposal. Recently the opinion of the EU parliament was submitted that proposes numerous changes. The present article leaves the discussion of details about the possible organization of such a system and analyses the impacts of a green electricity certificate trade with emission targets on state level. It is shown that with the currently discussed conditions the Member States have few incentives to buy green electricity certificates as the overall costs to fulfil the emission and green electricity targets could rise. The national fulfilment of green electricity targets could therefore be cheaper in an overall view. However, it is unclear if such plans are compatible with the rules of the EU internal market. Therefore there could be “forced losers” among EU member states.     

Und Aktion! – Konzeptualisierung der Rolle individuellen Akteurshandelns in sozio-technischen Transitionen am Beispiel der regionalen Energiewende im bayerischen Allgäu

The German “Energiewende” is one of the most ambitious societal transition projects in recent times. It causes fundamental political and economic changes in the energy system in Germany and the whole of Europe. These great societal and technological changes of the current energy regime are of particular interest for research on sustainability transitions. In this research strand, however, the role of individual agency for socio-technical transitions is hardly considered. What drives actors who decisively pushed the regional energy transition? Which strategies and types of action do they choose to foster the transition? How do individual strategies and actions depend on the socio-technical system environment and how does the socio-technical system environment react to the individual actions? To analyse these questions, we apply the Human-Environment Systems (HES) Framework (Scholz, 2011) for the first time to socio-technical systems. Based on an exemplary analysis of the regional energy transition in the Allgäu region in Germany, we propose an adaptation of the HES Framework for socio-technical systems. Finally, we reflect on how the adapted HES framework for socio-technical systems can contribute to a better understanding of individual agency in systemic transitions.