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Electricity Externalities, Siting, and the Energy Mix: A Survey / Heinz Welsch. University of Oldenburg. Department of Economics, October 2016, 47 p. (Oldenburg Discussion Papers in Economics ; V–394–16) http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:old:dpaper:394While early literature on electricity externalities was largely concerned with fossil fuel power generation and the associated emissions, nuclear accidents (Chernobyl, Fukushima) and the large-scale deployment of renewable energy facilities have spurred a wave of research on the externalities of nuclear power and renewable energies. The issue is important because many countries have started reconsidering their energy policies, and the externalities from electricity generation play a major role in the benefit-cost analysis of relevant options. This paper reviews the literature on electricity-related externalities. It starts by discussing their nature and the methods employed in valuing them. It finds that appraisals of electricity externalities are complicated because of heterogeneity of both the externalities themselves and the methods applied in measuring them. The paper reviews valuation studies of the externalities from fossil fuel, nuclear and renewable sources, and it discusses the relevance of their findings for the siting of plants and the electricity mix. It concludes by pointing out gaps in our knowledge about electricity externalities that deserve to be addressed in future research.Description of European policies and issues related to electricity pricing / Marel Cech and Karel Janda. October 2016, 24 p. (MPRA Paper No. 74600) https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/74600/This paper is focused on the description of institutional, technical, economic, legal and other relevant issues of electricity pricing in the European Union connected with the increasing use of renewable energy sources in electricity production and consumption. It provides background information related to the types of energy sources along with the summary of their advantages and disadvantages regarding both the environmental impact and financial costs. Furthermore, it involves fundamental global and European electricity production statistics and a summary of the European Union approach to the support of environment-friendly energy production methods.Panel regression analysis of electricity prices and renewable energy in the European Union / Marel Cech and Karel Janda. October 2016, 42 p. (MPRA Paper No. 74601) https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/74601/Abstract. This paper provides an econometric panel data model with data collected from 13 member states of the European Union over the period between 2010 and 2013 analysing two energy and climate relationships. First, it investigates the impact of the share of renewable energy sources in the final electricity production on the European consumer electricity prices. Second, it analyzes whether the replacement of fossil fuels by renewable energy causes a significant decrease in the greenhouse gases (specifically carbon dioxide) emissions. The results of our model analysis suggest that household electricity prices in the studied countries increase with the deployment of renewable electricity production. On the contrary, a negative effect of the renewables used in energy consumption on the CO2 emissions produced was found by the model regression.Oil price and economic growth : a long story ? / María Dolores Gadea and Antonio Montañés, University of Saragoza, and Ana Gómez-Loscos, Banco de Espana. Banco de Espana, 2016, 50 p. (Documentos de Trabajo. Nº 1625) http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bde:wpaper:1625This study investigates changes in the relationship between oil prices and the US economy from a long-term perspective. Although neither of the two series (oil price and GDP growth rates) presents structural breaks in mean, we identify different volatility periods in both of them, separately. From a multivariate perspective, we do not observe a signifi cant effect between changes in oil prices and GDP growth when considering the full period. However, we fi nd a signifi cant relationship in some subperiods by carrying out a rolling analysis and by investigating the presence of structural breaks in the multivariate framework. Finally, we obtain evidence, by means of a time-varying VAR, that the impact of the oil price shock on GDP growth has declined over time. We also observe that the negative effect is greater at the time of large oil price increases, supporting previous evidence of nonlinearity in the relationship.Global Gas Security Review 2016 : How Flexible are LNG Markets in Practice ? / Costanza Jacazio, Willem Braat, Pedro Cespedes Ruiz, Volker Kraayvanger and Minoru Muranaka. Paris : IEA, 2016, 117 p. http://www.iea.org/publications/freepublications/publication/global-gas-security-review-2016.htmlAs the energy system becomes more globalised and interconnected, gas security challenges are evolving. The current period of gas oversupply – driven by overcapacity in the LNG market – should not overshadow the critical importance of global gas security.The Global Gas Security Review 2016, the first edition of a new annual series,examines the evolving global gas market structures and looks at the market’s ability to respond to potential shocks. It shows that the current situation could lead to a false sense of comfort about gas security, which could evaporate quickly once market conditions change.The report also analyses how LNG markets responded to the Fukushima accident through case studies focusing on Japan and Europe. Both regions have fuel-switching potential but also face structural changes as coal and oil-fired capacity retires, affecting the gas market’s flexibility to respond to overall shocks.Global Gas Security Review 2016 also addresses two critical forward-looking questions: how much redundancy is embedded in the LNG upstream and liquefaction chain, and how flexible is LNG production?Impact of Demand Response Participation in Energy, Reserve and Capacity Markets / Sheila Nolan and Mel Devine and Muireann Lynch and Mark O'Malley. Dublin : Electricity Research Centre, University College ;  Economic and Social Research Institute ; Department of Economics, Trinity College, oct. 2016, 36 p. https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/74672/Demand response is capable of providing multiple services, including energy and reserve. As a consequence of providing energy, demand response is also inherently contributing to generation adequacy, and thus may be in entitled to avail of revenue from a capacity remuneration mechanism. Participation in multiple markets may result in a trade-o, thus necessitating simultaneous optimization of the demand response provision of such services. This paper uses Mixed Complementarity Problems to investigate these trade-os and resulting market outcomes in the presence of load-shifting demand response. An approach to approximate the capacity value of the demand response resource, thereby permitting its participation in the capacity market, is also presented. It is found that, for the case study examined here, that demand response has its most signicant impact on the energy market, with marginal and negligible impacts on the capacity and reserve market, respectively. The results also suggest that considerable cost savings are attainable by the DR aggregator through participation in the energy market, but that signicant further cost savings are not forthcoming through participation in the reserve or capacity market.