IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/enp/wpaper/ep01.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Issues and options for restructuring electricity supply industries

Author

Listed:
  • David Newbery

Abstract

The electricity supply industry is highly capital-intensive, whose success depends critically upon the management of its investment. In most developing countries investment is poorly managed, poorly maintained, and often inadequate. Inadequate regulation or political control lead to low prices that undermine the finance of investment and give poor incentives for management and operation. The paper argues that regulation must be carefully designed to provide efficient incentives and adequate guarantees to sustain investment and operations and only then will privatisation improve performance and benefit consumers. The paper discusses the evidence for these claims, the circumstances required for full unbundling and liberalisation to be successful, and those where the Single Buyer Model or continued, ideally reformed, state ownership, may be preferable, at least until conditions improve.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • David Newbery, 2002. "Issues and options for restructuring electricity supply industries," Working Papers EP01, Energy Policy Research Group, Cambridge Judge Business School, University of Cambridge.
    • Handle: RePEc:enp:wpaper:ep01
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/eprg-wp1.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gilbert,Richard J. & Kahn,Edward P. (ed.), 1996. "International Comparisons of Electricity Regulation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521495905.
    2. Newbery, David M., 1997. "Privatisation and liberalisation of network utilities," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 41(3-5), pages 357-383, April.
    3. Pablo Serra & Ronald Fischer, 2000. "Regulating the Electricity Sector in Latin America," Economía Journal, The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association - LACEA, vol. 0(Fall 2000), pages 155-218, August.
    4. Richard Green & Tanga McDaniel, 1998. "Competition in electricity supply: will ‘1998’ Be worth it?," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 19(3), pages 273-293, August.
    5. Preetum Domah & Michael G. Pollitt, 2001. "The restructuring and privatisation of the electricity distribution and supply businesses in England," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 107-146, March.
    6. Jamasb, T. & Pollitt, M., 2000. "Benchmarking and regulation: international electricity experience," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 107-130, September.
    7. Newbery, David M., 1997. "Determining the regulatory asset base for utility price regulation," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 6(1), pages 1-8, March.
    8. Pollitt, M. G., 1997. "The Restructuring and Privatisation of the Electricity Supply Industry in Northern Ireland: Will it be Worth it?," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 9701, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    9. Paul L. Joskow, 2001. "California's Electricity Crisis," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 17(3), pages 365-388.
    10. Newbery, D.M. & Pollitt, M.G., 1996. "The Restructuring and Privatisation of the CEGB: Was It Worth It?," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 9607, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    11. Bogorad, Cynthia S. & Penn, David W., 2001. "Cost-of-Service Rates to Market-Based Rates to Price Caps to ?!#?#!?," The Electricity Journal, Elsevier, vol. 14(4), pages 61-72, May.
    12. David M. Newbery, 2002. "Privatization, Restructuring, and Regulation of Network Utilities," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262640481, December.
    13. Richard J. Gilbert & David M. Newbery, 1994. "The Dynamic Efficiency of Regulatory Constitutions," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 25(4), pages 538-554, Winter.
    14. Watts, Price C., 2001. "Heresy? The Case Against Deregulation of Electricity Generation," The Electricity Journal, Elsevier, vol. 14(4), pages 19-24, 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. David M Newbery, 2002. "Regulating Unbundled Network Utilities," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 33(1), pages 23-41.
    2. Newbery, David M., 2001. "Economic reform in Europe: integrating and liberalizing the market for services," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 85-97, June.
    3. Newbery, David M., 2002. "Problems of liberalising the electricity industry," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 46(4-5), pages 919-927, May.
    4. Jamasb, T. & Mota, R. & Newbery, D. & Pollitt, M., 2004. "‘Electricity Sector Reform in Developing Countries: A Survey of Empirical Evidence on Determinants and Performance’," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0439, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    5. Newbery, D., 2002. "Regulatory Challenges to European Electricity Liberalisation," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0230, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    6. Mota, R.L., 2003. "The Restructuring and Privatisation of Electricity Distribution and Supply Business in Brazil: A Social Cost-Benefit Analysis," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0309, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    7. Adwoa Asantewaa & Tooraj Jamasb & Manuel Llorca, 2022. "Electricity Sector Reform Performance in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Parametric Distance Function Approach," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(6), pages 1-29, March.
    8. Tooraj Jamasb, 2002. "Reform and regulation of the electricity sectors in developing countries," Working Papers EP08, Energy Policy Research Group, Cambridge Judge Business School, University of Cambridge.
    9. Yin-Fang Zhang & David Parker & Colin Kirkpatrick, 2008. "Electricity sector reform in developing countries: an econometric assessment of the effects of privatization, competition and regulation," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 33(2), pages 159-178, April.
    10. Mota, R.L., 2004. "‘Comparing Brazil and USA electricity performance; what was the impact of privatisation?’," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0423, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    11. Littlechild Stephen C., 2002. "Competition in Retail Electricity Supply," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 12(2), pages 1-26, June.
    12. Toru Hattori & Jamasb, T. & Pollitt, M.G., 2002. "Relative Performance of UK and Japanese Electricity Distribution Systems 1985-1998: Lessons for Incentive Regulation," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0212, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    13. Stern, J., 2000. "Electricity and telecommunications regulatory institutions in small and developing countries," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 131-157, September.
    14. Tin Cheuk Leung & Kwok Ping Ping & Kevin K. Tsui, 2019. "What can deregulators deregulate? The case of electricity," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 1-32, August.
    15. João Lizardo de Araújo, 2001. "A questão do investimento no Setor Elétrico Brasileiro: reforma e crise [The investment in the Brazilian power sector: reform and crisis]," Nova Economia, Economics Department, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (Brazil), vol. 11(1), pages 77-96, July.
    16. Martín Rossi, 2015. "Using Labor Productivity Change Estimates as an Input for X-Factors in Price-Cap Regulation," Working Papers 118, Universidad de San Andres, Departamento de Economia, revised Feb 2015.
    17. Levine, Paul & Rickman, Neil, 2002. "Price Regulation, Investment and the Commitment Problem," CEPR Discussion Papers 3200, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Tovar, Beatriz & Javier Ramos-Real, Francisco & de Almeida, Edmar Fagundes, 2011. "Firm size and productivity. Evidence from the electricity distribution industry in Brazil," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(2), pages 826-833, February.
    19. Pollitt, Michael, 2009. "Evaluating the evidence on electricity reform: Lessons for the South East Europe (SEE) market," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 13-23, March.
    20. Nepal, Rabindra & Jamasb, Tooraj, 2015. "Incentive regulation and utility benchmarking for electricity network security," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 117-127.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • K23 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - Regulated Industries and Administrative Law
    • L51 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Economics of Regulation
    • L94 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Transportation and Utilities - - - Electric Utilities

    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:enp:wpaper:ep01. 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: Ruth Newman (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/jicamuk.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.