Residential grid storage technology battles: a multi-criteria analysis using BWM

This article focuses on the battle for dominance between various battery technologies in the residential grid storage market (< 10?KWh) in the context of residential energy systems and the related home energy management systems. We focus on five major battery technologies that are available in the market (lithium-based batteries, lead-based batteries, flow batteries, nickel-based batteries, and sodium-based batteries). Based on a literature review and expert interviews, we study the factors for technology success in the residential grid storage market. By applying the best worst method (BWM), we assign the relative importance to the factors and predict which technology will have the highest chance of achieving success. We compare this to the technology that now has the highest market share and conclude that BWM is a useful method to indicate technology dominance in this market.     

Smokeless tobacco,smoking cessation and harm reduction: an economic analysis

Good estimates place ‘hard core’ smoking rates in the United States at approximately 25%, with little change over the decade of the 1990s. This paper examines the possibilities of ‘harm reduction’ with the use of smokeless tobacco. Specifically, using an econometric model we seek to determine whether an increase in the use of smokeless tobacco would lead to reduced smoking rates in the United States. Applying our model to the NHANES III (National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey) we find that the use of smokeless tobacco by an average U.S. male smoker would increase the average probability of smoke cessation by over 10%. Approximately 3 million additional ‘quits’ would result for 26 million smokers. Our study permits an examination of cessation by age groups and we find that males who use smokeless tobacco between 16 and 65 have a 10–14% probability of quitting but that the probability falls beyond age 66. Important implications for life extension and health costs would attend these results with, under conservative assumptions, life years saved approximating 2.16 million and health care cost-savings of about $3 billion per year.     

Willingness to pay for electric vehicles and their attributes

This article presents a stated preference study of electric vehicle choice using data from a national survey. We used a choice experiment wherein 3029 respondents were asked to choose between their preferred gasoline vehicle and two electric versions of that preferred vehicle. We estimated a latent class random utility model and used the results to estimate the willingness to pay for five electric vehicle attributes: driving range, charging time, fuel cost saving, pollution reduction, and performance. Driving range, fuel cost savings, and charging time led in importance to respondents. Individuals were willing to pay (wtp) from $35 to $75 for a mile of added driving range, with incremental wtp per mile decreasing at higher distances. They were willing to pay from $425 to $3250 per hour reduction in charging time (for a 50 mile charge). Respondents capitalized about 5 years of fuel saving into the purchase price of an electric vehicle. We simulated our model over a range of electric vehicle configurations and found that people with the highest values for electric vehicles were willing to pay a premium above their wtp for a gasoline vehicle that ranged from $6000 to $16,000 for electric vehicles with the most desirable attributes. At the same time, our results suggest that battery cost must drop significantly before electric vehicles will find a mass market without subsidy.     

GASOLINE PRICES,GOVERNMENT SUPPORT,AND THE DEMAND FOR HYBRID VEHICLES IN THE UNITED STATES*

We analyze the determinants of hybrid vehicle demand, focusing on gasoline prices and income tax incentives. We find that hybrid vehicle sales in 2006 would have been 37% lower had gasoline prices stayed at the 1999 levels, and the effect of the federal income tax credit program is estimated at 20% in 2006. Under the program, the cost of reducing gasoline consumption was $75 per barrel in government revenue and that of CO₂ emission reduction was $177 per ton. We show that the cost effectiveness of federal tax programs can be improved by a flat rebate scheme.     

Does a college education cause better health and health behaviours?

In this article, we exploit the recent higher education expansion in China to apply a regression discontinuity method to identify the causal effects of higher education on health and health behaviours. We do not find causal effect of a college education on better smoking and drinking behaviours. For our selected measures of health, we do not find causal effect of a college education on better self-assessed health, less chance of having illness in the past 3 months and keeping normal body weight; however, we find that a college education could significantly reduce the probability of having hypertension.     

ESTIMATES OF THE PRICE ELASTICITY OF SWITCHING BETWEEN BRANDED AND GENERIC DRUGS

We estimate price elasticities of switching from branded to generic drugs for two widely used drugs: Prozac and Zocor. We find the price elasticity of switching varies by drug and is between 0.01 and 0.10. While elasticity estimates for Zocor are robust to the inclusion of controls for supply‐side factors, those for Prozac are not. Our results indicate consumers in managed care plans are most responsive to differences in out‐of‐pocket (OOP) cost, and we estimate that a 10% increase in the OOP cost difference between Zocor and generic Simvastatin increases an individual's probability of switching to the generic by approximately 0.3%. This would result in a modest total savings of $36,700 among our sample of 114,218 privately insured Zocor users. Our finding that individuals are relatively unresponsive to the lower prices caused by generic introduction implies that policies targeting supply‐side behavior are likely to have a larger effect on generic uptake than price‐based inducements. If generic‐uptake did occur immediately within the first 18 months after generic introduction, the total savings among individuals and insurance companies within our sample would be approximately $7 million for Zocor and $255,000 for Prozac. (JEL I11, I18)     

Health economic evaluation of Gd-EOB-DTPA MRI vs ECCM-MRI and multi-detector computed tomography in patients with suspected hepatocellular carcinoma in Thailand and South Korea

Objective: The effectiveness of treatment decisions and economic outcomes of using gadolinium ethoxybenzyl diethylenetriamine pentaacetic acid-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (Gd-EOB-DTPA-MRI) were compared with extracellular contrast media-enhanced MRI (ECCM-MRI) and multi-detector computed tomography (MDCT) as initial procedures in patients with suspected hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in South Korea and Thailand. Methods: A decision-tree model simulated the clinical pathway for patients with suspected HCC from the first imaging procedure to a confirmed treatment decision. Input data (probabilities and resource consumptions) were estimated and validated by clinical experts. Costs for diagnostic alternatives and related treatment options were derived from published sources, taking into account both payer’s and hospital’s perspectives. Results: All experts from Korea and Thailand agreed that Gd-EOB-DTPA-MRI yields the highest diagnostic certainty and minimizes the need for additional confirmatory diagnostic procedures in HCC. In Korea, from the payer’s perspective, total cost was USD $3087/patient to reach a confirmed treatment decision using Gd-EOB-DTPA-MRI (vs $3205/patient for MDCT and $3403/patient for ECCM-MRI). From the hospital’s perspective, Gd-EOB-DTPA-MRI incurred the lowest cost ($2289/patient vs $2320/patient and $2528/patient, respectively). In Thailand, Gd-EOB-DTPA-MRI was the least costly alternative for the payer ($702/patient vs $931/patient for MDCT and $873/patient for ECCM-MRI). From the hospital’s perspective, costs were $1106/patient, $1178/patient, and $1087/patient for Gd-EOB-DTPA-MRI, MDCT, and ECCM-MRI, respectively. Conclusions: Gd-EOB-DTPA-MRI as an initial imaging procedure in patients with suspected HCC provides better diagnostic certainty and relevant statutory health insurance cost savings in Thailand and Korea, compared with ECCM-MRI and MDCT.     

THE IMPACT OF SOCIETAL RISK ATTITUDES ON TERRORISM AND COUNTERTERRORISM

We analyze decisions made by a group of terrorists and a target government in a zero-sum game in which the terrorists minimize, and the government maximizes, the expected utility of the median voter in the target country. The terrorists' strategy balances the probability and the severity of the attack while the government chooses the level of investment reducing the probability and/or mitigating the severity of attacks. We find that risk aversion affects the strategies of both the government and the terrorists, leading to more severe, less frequent attacks but not necessarily more counterterrorism expenditures.     

Estimating the long-term effects of utility energy conservation programs: A Pacific Northwest example

The Bonneville Power Administration operated a Residential Weatherization Pilot Program from 1980 through 1982. The program provided free home energy audits to 7200 electrically heated homes in the Pacific Northwest and gave zero-interest loans to weatherize 4100 of these homes. The total cost of the program was almost $11 million.The pilot program and its regionwide successor are intended to provide benefits to the Pacific Northwest region for roughly 30 years in terms of reduced residential energy consumption. Therefore, it is important to determine the durability of the electricity savings due to the program. Estimates of long-term savings affect power supply planning in the region and influence the economics of the program itself (i.e., the level of funding that BPA can justify for the program).This article presents empirical results concerning the total and net energy-saving affects of the BPA pilot program 1, 2, and 3 years after participation. The total annual electricity saving experienced by households that received an energy audit and a weatherization loan averaged 5300 kWh 1 year after participation, increasing to 6000 and 6500 kWh 2 and 3 years after participation, respectively. The net annual electricity saving that can be directly attributed to the program for these audit plus loan households averaged 4500 kWh (15% of preprogram use) 1 year after participation and declined slightly to about 4300 kWh 2 years and 4200 kWh 3 years after participation.The article uses these empirical findings with a simple simulation model to estimate the effects of the program into the future. Assuming that electricity prices remain constant after 1984, total energy savings increase to a level of 7000 kWh, while net energy savings decrease to 3600 kWh for the audit plus loan households. Alternative electricity price scenarios are discussed.     

On the Uncertainty About the Total Economic Impact of Climate Change

This paper uses a vote-counting procedure to estimate the probability density function of the total economic impact as a parabolic function of global warming. There is a wide range of uncertainty about the impact of climate change up to 3°C, and the information becomes progressively more diffuse beyond that. Warming greater than 3°C most likely has net negative impacts, and warming greater than 7°C may lead to a total welfare loss. The expected value of the social cost of carbon is about $29/tC in 2015 and rises at roughly 2% per year.     

An options-based approach to forecast competing bids: evidence for Canadian takeover battles

During takeover battles, a tender offer provides a call option right to the target’s shareholders: it guarantees the offered price but maintains the chance of a higher offer. We present an options-based approach to estimate the probability and expected value of higher competing takeover bids using target stock price data. Analysing Canadian takeover battles in the period 1997 to 2007 we find that during the 5 trading days prior to the occurrence of an increased takeover bid, the estimated probability of a higher bid exceeds 80% on average and the expected value of a potential competing bid almost matches the realized value.     

FOUR REVOLUTIONS IN ELECTRIC EFFICIENCY

Demand prospects for electricity are being altered profoundly by four synergistic types of revolutionary change: new technologies for improved end-use efficiency, new ways to finance and deliver those technologies to customers, cultural change within utilities, and regulatory reforms to reward efficient behavior. Dramatic energy savings achieved so far have been largely in direct fuels and not in electricity, mainly due to price distortions and unique market failures. Resulting inefficient use of electricity is misallocating some $60 billion a year to unnecessary expansions of U.S. electric supply. Yet the best technologies now on the market could save about 92 percent of U.S. lighting energy, about half of motor energy, and much of the electricity used for other purposes. Complete retrofit could deliver equal or better services with only a fourth of the electricity now used. The levelized cost of that quadrupled end-use efficiency averages about 0.6 cents/kWh– well below short-run marginal cost. Analogous oil-saving potential from the best demonstrated technologies is about 80 percent of present oil consumption at an average cost below $3/bbl, partly because two of the 9–10 prototype cars already tested at 67–138 miles per gallon are said to cost nothing extra to make. Many utilities already save large amounts of electricity very quickly and cheaply by financing customers' efficiency improvements through loans, gifts, rebates, or leases. Even more promising is an emerging “negawatt market” making saved electricity a fungible commodity subject to competitive bidding, arbitrage, derivative instruments, secondary markets, etc. Utilities can make more money selling less electricity and more efficiency. They can earn a spread on the difference in discount rates between themselves and their customers. They can save operating and capital costs while avoiding the associated risks and, under emerging regulatory reforms, can even keep as extra profit part of what they save. They also can generate tradeable emissions rights under the new Clean Air Act. Some utilities now properly ignore sunk costs and seek to minimize marginal variable costs. These utilities, driven by economic– not accounting–principles, find this approach both profitable and operationally advantageous.     

A Monte Carlo simulation estimating US hospital cost reductions associated with hypotension control in septic ICU patients

Objective: This economic analysis extends upon a recent epidemiological study to estimate the association between hypotension control and hospital costs for septic patients in US intensive care units (ICUs).

Methods: A Monte Carlo simulation decision analytic model was developed that accounted for the probability of complications—acute kidney injury and mortality—in septic ICU patients and the cost of each health outcome from the hospital perspective. Probabilities of complications were calculated based on observational data from 110?US hospitals for septic ICU patients (n?=?8,782) with various levels of hypotension exposure as measured by mean arterial pressure (MAP, units: mmHg). Costs for acute kidney injury (AKI) and mortality were derived from published literature. Each simulation calculated mean hospital cost reduction and 95% confidence intervals based on 10,000 trials.

Results: In the base-case analysis hospital costs for a hypothetical “control” cohort (MAP of 65?mmHg) were $699 less per hospitalization (95% CI: $342–$1,116) relative to a “case” cohort (MAP of 60?mmHg). In the most extreme case considered (45?mmHg vs 65?mmHg), the associated cost reduction was $4,450 (95% CI: $2,020–$7,581). More than 99% of the simulated trials resulted in cost reductions. A conservative institution-level analysis for a hypothetical hospital (which assumes no benefit for increasing MAP above 65?mmHg) estimated a cost decline of $417 for a 5?mmHg increase in MAP per ICU septic patient. These results are applicable to the US only.

Conclusions: Hypotension control (via MAP increases) for patients with sepsis in the ICU is associated with lower hospitalization cost.     

Hospital costs associated with intraoperative hypotension among non-cardiac surgical patients in the US: a simulation model

Objective: Recent studies indicate intraoperative hypotension, common in non-cardiac surgical patients, is associated with myocardial injury, acute kidney injury, and mortality. This study extends on these findings by quantifying the association between intraoperative hypotension and hospital expenditures in the US.

Methods: Monte Carlo simulations (10,000 trial per simulation) based on current epidemiological and cost outcomes literature were developed for both acute kidney injury (AKI) and myocardial injury in non-cardiac surgery (MINS). For AKI, three models with different epidemiological assumptions (two models based on observational studies and one model based on a randomized control trial [RCT]) estimate the marginal probability of AKI conditional on intraoperative hypotension status. Similar models are also developed for MINS (except for the RCT case). Marginal probabilities of AKI and MINS sequelae (myocardial infarction, congestive heart failure, stroke, cardiac catheterization, and percutaneous coronary intervention) are multiplied by marginal cost estimates for each outcome to evaluate costs associated with intraoperative hypotension.

Results: The unadjusted (adjusted) model found hypotension control lowers the absolute probability of AKI by 2.2% (0.7%). Multiplying these probabilities by the marginal cost of AKI, the unadjusted (adjusted) AKI model estimated a cost reduction of $272 [95% CI?=?$223–$321] ($86 [95% CI?=?$47–$127]) per patient. The AKI model based on relative risks from the RCT had a mean cost reduction estimate of $281 (95% CI?=?–$346–$750). The unadjusted (adjusted) MINS model yielded a cost reduction of $186 [95% CI?=?$73–$393] ($33 [95% CI?=?$10–$77]) per patient.

Conclusions: The model results suggest improved intraoperative hypotension control in a hospital with an annual volume of 10,000 non-cardiac surgical patients is associated with mean cost reductions ranging from $1.2–$4.6 million per year. Since the magnitude of the RCT mean estimate is similar to the unadjusted observational model, the institutional costs are likely at the upper end of this range.     

Quantitative easing and default probability of corporate social responsibility in US

The US Federal Reserve’s quantitative easing (QE) policies lowered the cost of servicing corporate debt and enhanced firms’ ability to borrow. This article seeks to improve the accuracy of default probability calculations as proposed by Merton (1974) under conditions of lower interest rates resulting from QE. By modifying the long-term debt ratio, we find distance to default is undervalued. Specifically, we find that the distance to default is more stably for firms with excellent corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance, but those with poor CSR performance are significantly undervalued. Our results show that improved CSR performance correctly estimates the firm’s default risk, even during QE when the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet expanded by nearly $4.5 trillion.     

The effects of government intervention on the market for corporate terrorism insurance

Nine OECD countries presently have national terrorism insurance programs based on some type of public–private risk sharing. While such arrangements have helped provide the necessary insurance capacity in the post-September 11, 2001 era, little is known about the effect of such governmental intervention on terrorism insurance markets. This paper focuses on the United States, where the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act of 2002 (TRIA) provides insurers with no cost federal reinsurance up to an industry-wide loss of $100 billion. We present an empirical analysis to compare how insurers' diversification behavior varies between property coverage (no governmental intervention) and terrorism coverage (with government intervention). We find evidence that insurers in the U.S. are much less diversified for terrorism coverage than they are for property lines of coverage. We interpret these findings as tentative evidence for moral hazard caused by the governmental intervention under TRIA.     

贝前列腺素钠对比西洛他唑和沙格雷酯治疗下肢外周动脉闭塞的成本-效用

目的 评价贝前列腺素钠分别对比西洛他唑和沙格雷酯在治疗外周动脉疾病(PAD)方面的经济效益,为PAD患者的治疗及医保支付提供循证决策依据.方法 利用决策树模型,模拟6个月用药周期内的健康经济产出.模型结果产出包括直接医疗成本、生命质量调整年(QALYs),以及增量成本-效用比(ICUR).临床疗效数据和患者医疗成本数据...     

The effect of information on the bidding and survival of entrants in procurement auctions

In government procurement auctions of construction contracts, entrants are typically less informed and bid more aggressively than incumbent firms. This bidding behavior makes them more susceptible to losses affecting their prospect of survival. In April of 2000, the Oklahoma Department of Transportation started releasing the internal cost estimates to complete highway construction projects. Using newly developed quantile regression approaches, this paper examines the impact of the policy change on aggressive entrants. First, we find that the information release eliminates the bidding differential between entrants and incumbents attributed to informational asymmetries. Second, we argue that the policy change affects the prospects of survival of entrants in the market. We find that those who used to exit the market relatively soon are now staying 37% longer, while at the median level bidding duration increased by roughly 68%. The policy has the potential to encourage entry in government procurement auctions and thus increase competition.     

历史文化古城游憩利用价值评估--以凤凰古城为例

在界定历史文化古城游憩利用价值的基础上,以凤凰古城实地调研数据为依据,利用旅行费用法(TCM)对其游憩利用价值进行评估。结果显示,2003年凤凰古城的游憩利用价值为90 428.82万元,其中旅行费用55 069.50万元、消费者剩余12 396.75万元、旅行时间价值5 699.58万元和其它费用17 262.72万元。     

The causal effect of coalition governments on fiscal policies: evidence from a Regression Kink Design

Proportional election systems are widespread across countries and often lead to coalition governments. This creates interest in how the form of government (single-party or coalition governments) causally influences fiscal policies. It is difficult to estimate this causal effect empirically because the form of government is not randomly assigned to political units. I overcome this problem by using a Regression Kink Design which exploits that there is a slope change in the treatment probability at the 50% vote share of the strongest party. This method is applied to a large panel data set of German local governments. I find that contrary to the theoretical prediction, coalition governments significantly decrease expenditures.