IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/enejou/v17y1996i2p79-102.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Social Benefits of Financial Investment Support in Energy Conservation Policy

Author

Listed:
  • Torleif Haugland

Abstract

This paper examines the costs and benefits of a Norwegian energy conservation program that provided financial support for investments in energy efficiency. Participants in the program included industry, commerce, public services and households. Evaluation of the program shows that about 70% of the participants were "free riders' who would have invested in efficiency improvements even in the absence of the program. The economic efficiency was further reduced by economic distortions caused by taxes needed to finance the program. However, the energy savings did give environmental benefits through reduced atmospheric emissions, although this effect was somewhat diluted through a "conservation rebound," where the actual reduction in energy consumption was less than the theoretical savings. The energy conservation program is also highly sensitive to assumptions about the economic lifetime of the investments.

Suggested Citation

  • Torleif Haugland, 1996. "Social Benefits of Financial Investment Support in Energy Conservation Policy," The Energy Journal, , vol. 17(2), pages 79-102, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:enejou:v:17:y:1996:i:2:p:79-102
    DOI: 10.5547/ISSN0195-6574-EJ-Vol17-No2-5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.5547/ISSN0195-6574-EJ-Vol17-No2-5
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.5547/ISSN0195-6574-EJ-Vol17-No2-5?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. Samuel Fankhauser, 1994. "The Social Costs of Greenhouse Gas Emissions: An Expected Value Approach," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2), pages 157-184.
    2. Paul L. Joskow & Donald B. Marron, 1992. "What Does a Negawatt Really Cost? Evidence from Utility Conservation Programs," The Energy Journal, , vol. 13(4), pages 41-74, October.
    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. Richard S.J. Tol, 2003. "The Marginal Costs Of Carbon Dioxide Emissions: An Assessment Of The Uncertainties," Working Papers FNU-19, Research unit Sustainability and Global Change, Hamburg University, revised Apr 2003.
    2. Arguedas, Carmen & van Soest, Daan P., 2009. "On reducing the windfall profits in environmental subsidy programs," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 192-205, September.
    3. Schleich, Joachim & Faure, Corinne & Meissner, Thomas, 2021. "Adoption of retrofit measures among homeowners in EU countries: The effects of access to capital and debt aversion," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    4. Pezzey, John C.V. & Burke, Paul J., 2014. "Towards a more inclusive and precautionary indicator of global sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 141-154.
    5. Jenya Kahn-Lang, 2016. "Effects of Electric Utility Decoupling on Energy Efficiency," The Energy Journal, , vol. 37(4), pages 297-314, October.
    6. O'Mahony, Tadhg & Escardó-Serra, Paula & Dufour, Javier, 2018. "Revisiting ISEW Valuation Approaches: The Case of Spain Including the Costs of Energy Depletion and of Climate Change," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 292-303.
    7. Frondel, Manuel & Schmidt, Christoph M., 2005. "Evaluating environmental programs: The perspective of modern evaluation research," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 515-526, December.
    8. Papineau, Maya, 2017. "Setting the standard? A framework for evaluating the cost-effectiveness of building energy standards," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 63-76.
    9. Louis-Gaëtan Giraudet & Antoine Missemer, 2019. "The Economics of Energy Efficiency, a Historical Perspective," CIRED Working Papers halshs-02301636, HAL.
    10. Aalbers, Rob & van der Heijden, Eline & Potters, Jan & van Soest, Daan & Vollebergh, Herman, 2009. "Technology adoption subsidies: An experiment with managers," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 431-442, May.
    11. Richard S.J. Tol, 2021. "Estimates of the social cost of carbon have not changed over time," Working Paper Series 0821, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    12. Fujino, Masaya & Kuriyama, Koichi & Yoshida, Kentaro, 2017. "An evaluation of the natural environment ecosystem preservation policies in Japan," Journal of Forest Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(PA), pages 62-67.
    13. Paul W. Parfomak & Lester B. Lave, 1996. "How Many Kilowatts are in a Negawatt? Verifying Ex Post Estimates of Utility Conservation Impacts at the Regional Level," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4), pages 59-87.
    14. Daniel Sutter, 2017. "Propagandistic Research and the U.S. Department of Energy: Energy Efficiency in Ordinary Life and Renewables in Electricity Production," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 14(1), pages 103–120-1, January.
    15. Havranek, Tomas & Irsova, Zuzana & Janda, Karel & Zilberman, David, 2015. "Selective reporting and the social cost of carbon," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 394-406.
    16. Norton, George W. & Alwang, Jeffrey, 1997. "Policy for Plenty: Measuring the Benefits of Policy-oriented Social Science Research," Staff Papers 232552, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics.
    17. Mubashir Qasim & Arthur Grimes, 2018. "Sustainable economic policy and well-being: The relationship between adjusted net savings and subjective well-being," Working Papers 18_06, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    18. Davis, Lucas & Martinez, Sebastian & Taboada, Bibiana, 2018. "How Effective is Energy-efficient Housing?: Evidence From a Field Experiment in Mexico," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 8767, Inter-American Development Bank.
    19. Page Kyle & Leon Clarke & Steven J. Smith & Son Kim & Mayda Nathan & Marshall Wise, 2011. "The Value of Advanced End-Use Energy Technologies in Meeting U.S. Climate Policy Goals," The Energy Journal, , vol. 32(1_suppl), pages 61-88, June.
    20. Lykke E. Andersen, 2015. "A Cost-benefit Analysis of Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon," Discussion Papers 0065, Instituto de Pesquisa Econômica Aplicada - IPEA.

    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:sae:enejou:v:17:y:1996:i:2:p:79-102. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.