IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/emetrp/v91y2023i5p1659-1693.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Investment Effects of Market Integration: Evidence From Renewable Energy Expansion in Chile

Author

Listed:
  • Luis E. Gonzales
  • Koichiro Ito
  • Mar Reguant

Abstract

We study the investment effects of market integration on renewable energy expansion. Our theory highlights that market integration not only improves allocative efficiency by gains from trade but also incentivizes new investment in renewable power plants. To test our theoretical predictions, we examine how recent grid expansions in the Chilean electricity market changed electricity production, wholesale prices, generation costs, and renewable investments. We then build a structural model of power plant entry to quantify the impact of market integration with and without the investment effects. We find that the market integration in Chile increased solar generation by around 180%, saved generation costs by 8%, and reduced carbon emissions by 5%. A substantial amount of renewable entry would not have occurred in the absence of market integration. Our findings suggest that ignoring these investment effects would substantially understate the benefits of market integration and its important role in expanding renewable energy.

Suggested Citation

  • Luis E. Gonzales & Koichiro Ito & Mar Reguant, 2023. "The Investment Effects of Market Integration: Evidence From Renewable Energy Expansion in Chile," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 91(5), pages 1659-1693, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:emetrp:v:91:y:2023:i:5:p:1659-1693
    DOI: 10.3982/ECTA20769
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.3982/ECTA20769
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.3982/ECTA20769?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Frank A. Wolak, 2007. "Quantifying the supply-side benefits from forward contracting in wholesale electricity markets," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(7), pages 1179-1209.
    2. Ignacia Mercadal, 2022. "Dynamic Competition and Arbitrage in Electricity Markets: The Role of Financial Players," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 665-699, August.
    3. Tamma Carleton & Michael Greenstone, 2021. "Updating the United States Government's Social Cost of Carbon," Working Papers 2021-04, Becker Friedman Institute for Research In Economics.
    4. Severin Borenstein & James. Bushnell & Steven Stoft, 2000. "The Competitive Effects of Transmission Capacity in A Deregulated Electricity Industry," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 31(2), pages 294-325, Summer.
    5. Olivier De Groote & Frank Verboven, 2019. "Subsidies and Time Discounting in New Technology Adoption: Evidence from Solar Photovoltaic Systems," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(6), pages 2137-2172, June.
    6. Steve Cicala, 2022. "Imperfect Markets versus Imperfect Regulation in US Electricity Generation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(2), pages 409-441, February.
    7. Abrell, Jan & Rausch, Sebastian, 2016. "Cross-country electricity trade, renewable energy and European transmission infrastructure policy," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 87-113.
    8. Mar Reguant, 2014. "Complementary Bidding Mechanisms and Startup Costs in Electricity Markets," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 81(4), pages 1708-1742.
    9. Frank A. Wolak, 2011. "Do Residential Customers Respond to Hourly Prices? Evidence from a Dynamic Pricing Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 83-87, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Luis E. GONZALES & ITO Koichiro & Mar REGUANT, 2022. "The Dynamic Impact of Market Integration: Evidence from renewable energy expansion in Chile," Discussion papers 22050, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    2. David P. Brown & Andrew Eckert & Douglas Silveira, 2023. "Strategic interaction between wholesale and ancillary service markets," Competition and Regulation in Network Industries, , vol. 24(4), pages 174-198, December.
    3. Bergheimer, Stefan & Cantillon, Estelle & Reguant, Mar, 2023. "Price and quantity discovery without commitment," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    4. Brown, David P. & Eckert, Andrew, 2021. "Analyzing firm behavior in restructured electricity markets: Empirical challenges with a residual demand analysis," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    5. Pio Baake & Sebastian Schwenen & Christian von Hirschhausen, 2020. "Local Power Markets," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1904, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    6. Pär Holmberg & Andy Philpott, 2014. "Supply function equilibria in transportation networks," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1421, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    7. David P. Brown & Andrew Eckert, 2018. "Analyzing the Impact of Electricity Market Structure Changes and Mergers: The Importance of Forward Commitments," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 52(1), pages 101-137, February.
    8. David P. Brown & Andrew Eckert, 2022. "Pricing Patterns in Wholesale Electricity Markets: Unilateral Market Power or Coordinated Behavior?," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(1), pages 168-216, March.
    9. Nicholas Ryan, 2017. "The Competitive Effects of Transmission Infrastructure in the Indian Electricity Market," NBER Working Papers 23106, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Olivier De Groote & Axel Gautier & Frank Verboven, 2020. "The political economic of financing climate policy : evidence from the solar PV subsidy programs," Working Paper Research 389, National Bank of Belgium.
    11. Jorge Balat & Juan E. Carranza & Juan D. Martin, 2015. "Dynamic and Strategic Behavior in Hydropower-Dominated Electricity Markets: Empirical Evidence for Colombia," Borradores de Economia 886, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
    12. Brehm, Paul A. & Zhang, Yiyuan, 2021. "The efficiency and environmental impacts of market organization: Evidence from the Texas electricity market," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    13. Jorge Balat & Juan Esteban Carranza & Juan David Martin & Alvaro Riascos, 2022. "The effects of changes in the regulation of the Colombian wholesale electricity market in a structural model of complex auctions," Borradores de Economia 1211, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
    14. Brown, David P. & Eckert, Andrew & Eckert, Heather, 2018. "Carbon pricing with an output subsidy under imperfect competition: The case of Alberta's restructured electricity market," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 102-123.
    15. Carlos Suarez, 2021. "Mixed Oligopoly and Market Power Mitigation: Evidence from the Colombian Wholesale Electricity Market," IREA Working Papers 202101, University of Barcelona, Research Institute of Applied Economics, revised Jan 2021.
    16. Rinne, Sonja, 2018. "Radioinactive: Are nuclear power plant outages in France contagious to the German electricity price?," CIW Discussion Papers 3/2018, University of Münster, Center for Interdisciplinary Economics (CIW).
    17. Victor Chernozhukov & Whitney K. Newey & Andres Santos, 2023. "Constrained Conditional Moment Restriction Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 91(2), pages 709-736, March.
    18. Holmberg, Pär & Tangerås, Thomas & Ahlqvist, Victor, 2018. "Central- versus Self-Dispatch in Electricity Markets," Working Paper Series 1257, Research Institute of Industrial Economics, revised 27 Mar 2019.
    19. Steve Cicala, 2022. "Imperfect Markets versus Imperfect Regulation in US Electricity Generation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(2), pages 409-441, February.
    20. Bohland, Moritz & Schwenen, Sebastian, 2022. "Renewable support and strategic pricing in electricity markets," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:emetrp:v:91:y:2023:i:5:p:1659-1693. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/essssea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.