- Consulting Editors
- [UNTITLED]
- List of Contributors
- The Macroeconomics of Global Warming
- Improving Climate Projections to Better Inform Climate Risk Management
- Energy Balance Climate Models, Damage Reservoirs, and The Time Profile of Climate Change Policy
- Economics of Environmental Regime Shifts
- Policy Scenarios in a Model of Optimal Economic Growth and Climate Change
- Adaptive Model-Predictive Climate Policies in a Multicountry Setting
- Prospects of Tools from Differential Games in the Study of Macroeconomics of Climate Change
- Fairness in Climate Negotiations: A Meta-Game Analysis Based on Community Integrated Assessment
- Climate Change and Second-Best Abatement in a Multiregion World with Endogenous Growth
- Global Warming and R&D-Based Growth in a Trade Model between Environmentally Sensitive and Environmentally Neglectful Countries
- Climate Change and Intergenerational Well-Being
- The Atmosphere as a Global Commons
- The Social Cost of Carbon
- Climate-Friendly Technological Change for Developing Countries
- Renewable Energy: Models, Implications, and Prospects
- Emission Trading Systems and Technological Innovation: A Random Matching Model
- The Reality of Nuclear Power: The Fukushima Experience and Its Impact
- Forecast-Based Pricing of Weather Derivatives
- Employment and Output Effects of Climate Policies
- Macroeconomic Effects of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Policies with a Focus on Germany
- Stabilization of Earth’s Climate in the 21st Century by the Stabilization of Per Capita Consumption
- Does the Kyoto Protocol Intensify Carbon Leakage to China?
- Climate Thresholds, Weather Extremes, and Catastrophic Losses
- Climate Impacts on Agriculture: A Challenge to Complacency?
- The Legal Framework of Global Environment Governance on Climate Change: A Critical Survey
- Environment and Development Challenges: The Imperative of a Carbon Fee and Dividend
- The Need for Sustainable Development and a Carbon Market: Avoiding Extinction
- Name Index
- Subject Index
Abstract and Keywords
This chapter investigates the prospects of renewable energy from an economic point of view and presents a few economic models that address specific issues. Although the transition to renewable energy is inevitable given the threats the world faces otherwise, the path is not so simple and definitely cannot be driven by only market forces. The upshot is that the prospects of substantial and cheap availability of renewable energy are very unlikely on economic grounds unless a number of issues, in particular regarding substantial technical breakthroughs and binding agreements on global warming mitigation, are simultaneously satisfied. Otherwise crucial players will counteract or undermine the apparent profitability. However, there is no alternative to renewable energy. Ultimately, renewable energy must prove its use in the market, and energy poverty in the Third World provides a huge and profitable playground for this.
Keywords: barriers, commitment, constraints, forecast, modeling, R&D, renewable energy, transition
Franz Wirl, Professor and Chair of Industry, Energy, and the Environment, Department of Business Administration, University of Vienna.
Yuri Yegorov, Faculty of Business, Economics, and Statistics, University of Vienna.
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- Consulting Editors
- [UNTITLED]
- List of Contributors
- The Macroeconomics of Global Warming
- Improving Climate Projections to Better Inform Climate Risk Management
- Energy Balance Climate Models, Damage Reservoirs, and The Time Profile of Climate Change Policy
- Economics of Environmental Regime Shifts
- Policy Scenarios in a Model of Optimal Economic Growth and Climate Change
- Adaptive Model-Predictive Climate Policies in a Multicountry Setting
- Prospects of Tools from Differential Games in the Study of Macroeconomics of Climate Change
- Fairness in Climate Negotiations: A Meta-Game Analysis Based on Community Integrated Assessment
- Climate Change and Second-Best Abatement in a Multiregion World with Endogenous Growth
- Global Warming and R&D-Based Growth in a Trade Model between Environmentally Sensitive and Environmentally Neglectful Countries
- Climate Change and Intergenerational Well-Being
- The Atmosphere as a Global Commons
- The Social Cost of Carbon
- Climate-Friendly Technological Change for Developing Countries
- Renewable Energy: Models, Implications, and Prospects
- Emission Trading Systems and Technological Innovation: A Random Matching Model
- The Reality of Nuclear Power: The Fukushima Experience and Its Impact
- Forecast-Based Pricing of Weather Derivatives
- Employment and Output Effects of Climate Policies
- Macroeconomic Effects of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Policies with a Focus on Germany
- Stabilization of Earth’s Climate in the 21st Century by the Stabilization of Per Capita Consumption
- Does the Kyoto Protocol Intensify Carbon Leakage to China?
- Climate Thresholds, Weather Extremes, and Catastrophic Losses
- Climate Impacts on Agriculture: A Challenge to Complacency?
- The Legal Framework of Global Environment Governance on Climate Change: A Critical Survey
- Environment and Development Challenges: The Imperative of a Carbon Fee and Dividend
- The Need for Sustainable Development and a Carbon Market: Avoiding Extinction
- Name Index
- Subject Index