IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/aaea06/21377.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Market Penetration of Biomass Fuels for Electricity Generation

Author

Listed:
  • Maung, Thein A.

Abstract

The electric power sector is a main source of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions that contribute to global warming. In the U.S., fossil fuel fired power plants are responsible for about 38% of the total CO2 emissions from all sources. Switching a significant portion of the U.S. electricity generating capacity from fossil fuels to biomass fuels would help reduce CO2 emissions from the electric power industries. At present, biomass accounts for only about 1% of the fuel used for electricity generation in the U.S. In contrast, coal alone accounts for about 50%, and nuclear, natural gas and petroleum explain for about 20%, 16% and 3% respectively of the fuels used for electricity generation. There are a number of factors that may influence the extent to which biomass fuels are to penetrate the electricity market: facility needs, growth in electricity demand, prices of fossil fuels and advances in technology. Electricity is generally produced in large, expensive and long-lived facilities. However new facilities or capitals are often built to meet demand growth. Capitals can be generally said to have a given productive lifetime. As new capital investment occurs and older capital is retired, electricity producers will have opportunities to substitute away from fossil fuels. Thus, an increase in the market penetration of biomass power will likely occur when existing fossil power plants are retired and replaced by new and less carbon intensive power plants. The market penetration of biomass electricity will also depend on a strong growth in electricity demand due to economic and population growth, availability and prices of fuels, environmental considerations and technological advances. Specifically, this paper will look at the potential for biomass penetration into the electricity market considering: a) prices of fossil fuels such as coal, natural gas and petroleum for power production, b) the capital turnover rate for existing stock of fossil power plants, c) changes in technologies which could facilitate the use of biomass as fuels for electricity generation.

Suggested Citation

  • Maung, Thein A., 2006. "Market Penetration of Biomass Fuels for Electricity Generation," 2006 Annual meeting, July 23-26, Long Beach, CA 21377, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:aaea06:21377
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.21377
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/21377/files/sp06ma10.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.21377?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. Denny Ellerman, A., 1996. "The competition between coal and natural gas the importance of sunk costs," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 22(1-2), pages 33-42.
    2. Sweeney, James L, 1984. "The Response of Energy Demand to Higher Prices: What Have We Learned?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(2), pages 31-37, May.
    3. Nelson, Randy A & Tietenberg, Tom & Donihue, Michael R, 1993. "Differential Environmental Regulation: Effects on Electric Utility Capital Turnover and Emissions," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 75(2), pages 368-373, May.
    4. Paul L. Joskow, 1987. "Productivity Growth and Technical Change in the Generation of Electricity," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 1), pages 17-38.
    5. Uwe Schneider & Bruce McCarl, 2003. "Economic Potential of Biomass Based Fuels for Greenhouse Gas Emission Mitigation," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 24(4), pages 291-312, April.
    6. Maloney, Michael T & Brady, Gordon L, 1988. "Capital Turnover and Marketable Pollution Rights," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(1), pages 203-226, April.
    7. Ulf Hansen, 1998. "Technological Options for Power Generation," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2), pages 63-87.
    8. Dahowski, R.T. & Dooley, J.J., 2004. "Carbon management strategies for US electricity generation capacity: A vintage-based approach," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 29(9), pages 1589-1598.
    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. List John A. & Millimet Daniel L & McHone Warren, 2004. "The Unintended Disincentive in the Clean Air Act," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 3(2), pages 1-28, February.
    2. Maung, Thein A. & McCarl, Bruce A., 2013. "Economic factors influencing potential use of cellulosic crop residues for electricity generation," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 81-91.
    3. Heutel, Garth, 2011. "Plant vintages, grandfathering, and environmental policy," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 36-51, January.
    4. Bialek, Sylwia & Gregory, Jack & Revesz, Richard L., 2022. "Still your grandfather's boiler: Estimating the effects of the Clean Air Act's grandfathering provisions," Working Papers 05/2022, German Council of Economic Experts / Sachverständigenrat zur Begutachtung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Entwicklung.
    5. Stavins, Robert & Jaffe, Adam & Newell, Richard, 2000. "Technological Change and the Environment," Working Paper Series rwp00-002, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    6. Stavins, Robert, 2004. "Environmental Economics," RFF Working Paper Series dp-04-54, Resources for the Future.
    7. Stavins, Robert, 2005. "The Effects of Vintage-Differentiated Environmental Regulation," Working Paper Series rwp05-031, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    8. Alfred Endres & Tim Friehe, 2014. "The reasonable person standard: trading off static and dynamic efficiency," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 249-267, April.
    9. Dalia Patino-Echeverri & Dallas Burtraw & Karen Palmer, 2013. "Flexible mandates for investment in new technology," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 44(2), pages 121-155, October.
    10. Patrik Söderholm, 2000. "Environmental Regulations and Interfuel Substitution in the Power Sector: A Generalized Leontief Model," Energy & Environment, , vol. 11(1), pages 1-23, January.
    11. Burtraw, Dallas & Woerman, Matt, 2013. "Economic ideas for a complex climate policy regime," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(S1), pages 24-31.
    12. Levinson, Arik, 1999. "Grandfather regulations, new source bias, and state air toxics regulations," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 299-311, February.
    13. Bushnell, James & Wolfram, Catherine, 2008. "Enforcement of Vintage Differentiated Regulations: The Case of New Source Review," Staff General Research Papers Archive 31185, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    14. Adam Jaffe & Richard Newell & Robert Stavins, 2002. "Environmental Policy and Technological Change," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 22(1), pages 41-70, June.
    15. Jaffe, Adam B. & Newell, Richard G. & Stavins, Robert N., 2003. "Chapter 11 Technological change and the environment," Handbook of Environmental Economics, in: K. G. Mäler & J. R. Vincent (ed.), Handbook of Environmental Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 11, pages 461-516, Elsevier.
    16. Adair, Sarah K. & Hoppock, David C. & Monast, Jonas J., 2014. "New Source Review and coal plant efficiency gains: How new and forthcoming air regulations affect outcomes," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 183-192.
    17. Nathaniel O. Keohane & Erin T. Mansur & Andrey Voynov, 2009. "Averting Regulatory Enforcement: Evidence from New Source Review," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(1), pages 75-104, March.
    18. Popp, David & Newell, Richard G. & Jaffe, Adam B., 2010. "Energy, the Environment, and Technological Change," Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, in: Bronwyn H. Hall & Nathan Rosenberg (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 873-937, Elsevier.
    19. Coysh, Daniel & Johnstone, Nick & Kozluk, Tomasz & Nachtigall, Daniel & Cárdenas Rodríguez, Miguel, 2020. "Vintage differentiated regulations and plant survival: Evidence from coal-fired power plants," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    20. Adam B. Jaffe & Richard G. Newell & Robert N. Stavins, 2004. "Technology Policy for Energy and the Environment," NBER Chapters, in: Innovation Policy and the Economy, Volume 4, pages 35-68, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Resource /Energy Economics and Policy;

    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:ags:aaea06:21377. 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: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aaeaaea.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.