2nd PhD Summer School on “Economic Foundations for Energy and Climate Policies”

 

Given the current COVID situation we have decided to postpone the PhD Summer School on “Economic Foundations for Energy and Climate Policies” until September 2021. More information will be provided on the website and a new call for submissions will be published next year.

We are pleased to announce that we will be organizing the second edition of the PhD Summer School on “Economic Foundations for Energy and Climate Policies”, which is jointly promoted by DIW Berlin, EUI-Florence School of Regulation, Technical University Berlin, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, University College London and Université Libre de Bruxelles. The School will combine lectures and policy sessions by leading researchers and policy makers in the field.

The Summer School will be held on September 7-11, 2020 at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (Downtown campus at Puerta de Toledo)

Confirmed instructors:

  • Stefan Ambec (Toulouse School of Economics): “Intermittency of Renewable Energy: Implications for Electricity Markets”
  • Estelle Cantillon (Université Libre de Bruxelles): “Design and Development of the EU’s ETS”
  • Xavier Labandeira (Universidade de Vigo): “A Primer on Environmental Taxes and Green Tax Reforms”
  • Juan Pablo Montero (Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile): “Environmental Regulation and the Transport Sector”, and “The Design of Environmental Instruments”

The main objective of the School is to provide PhD students in Economics with high-level academic training on the micro-economic foundations of energy and climate policies. The School is also aimed at supporting the development of a PhD-student network for students interested in the topic, and connect them with top academics in the field.

 

Energy: an Industry in Transition

The workshop “Energy: an Industry in Transition” gathered experts and practitioners across the energy sectors. The emphasis was put on the technological and regulatory innovations to address the Energy Transition.
The head of EnergyEcoLab, Natalia Fabra, participated in a roundtable entitled “Resources, Investments and Incentives for the Change”, chaired by Juan Luis López Cardenete.  A transcript for her words can be read here.
The full program can be downloaded here.
 

SERIEs Special Issue on The Economics of the Energy Transition

The Journal of the Spanish economic association (SERIEs) has just published the Call for Papers of a Special Issue on the Economics of the Energy Transition. The Guest Editors are Natalia Fabra
(Universidad Carlos III de Madrid) and Xavier Labandeira (Universidade de Vigo)

Scope of the Special Issue: The so called energy transition, i.e. the energy-related transformations to reach decarbonized societies,  will have profound socio-economic implications. In this issue we are looking for rigorous theoretical and empirical papers that contribute to understand the main policy challenges and macro and microeconomic effects associated with the energy transition. Among others, we invite submissions that cover the following topics:

  • Public policies related to energy and climate mitigation
  • Distributional impacts of the energy transition
  • Effects of the energy transition on growth and job creation
  • Sustainable finance and its contribution to the energy transition
  • Political economy issues related to the energy transition
  • The role of companies in the energy transition

**Extended deadline: July 15, 2020**

Submissions Instructions: Full manuscripts should be submitted electronically through the web page of the Journal of the Spanish Economic Association-SERIEs (link). Please, remember to select the option “SI: The Economics of the Energy Transition” in the prompt for “Select article Type”. First decisions and comments will be sent out no later than September 1, 2020.

The Journal of the Spanish Economic Association-SERIEs is a single-blind peer-reviewed open access journal published under the brand SpringerOpen. The journal publishes scientific articles in all areas of economics. The Web of Science two-year impact factor is 0.833 in 2018 and in Scopus, it is among Q1 journals (top 25%) in 2018 according to Scimago Journal Ranking and the CiteScores.

Link to the Call for Papers

Professional Course on The Energy Transition: Economics and Policy

Worldwide, the energy transition is underway. Whereas there is consensus regarding the need to reduce carbon emissions, promote renewables, and improve energy efficiency, there is still controversy regarding the optimal choice of policies to achieve those goals.

Policies differ in their efficiency impacts (i.e., whether they induce higher or lower costs), but also on their distributional implications (i.e., whether they create winners and losers). Furthermore, agents’ behavioral biases might impact the success or failure of the chosen policies.

With this triple focus on efficiency, equity and behavioral considerations, the Intensive Course on The Energy Transition: Economics and Policy, which will take place at the Barcelona GSE on June 11-12 2020, will provide participants (whether economists, engineers, or lawyers, working for firms or in regulatory agencies) with a thorough understanding of the most recent economic insights to analyze the performance of current and potential energy and climate policies. The course will mainly review policies affecting the transportation and power sectors, as well as the competition policy issues that are likely to arise during the energy transition. The program’s faculty includes leading international scholars and practitioners with extensive experience of the application of economic techniques to designing and assessing the performance of energy and climate policies. The Directors of the course are Massimo Motta (BGSE) and Natalia Fabra, head of EnergyEcoLab.

More information at
https://www.barcelonagse.eu/study/professional-courses/energy-economics

Annual Conference of the Spanish Association for Energy Economics

The XV Annual Conference of the Spanish Association for Energy Economics took place on January 29th-31st, 2020 at the University of Castilla-La Mancha.

The AEEE is the Spanish division of the International Association for Energy Economics (IAEE). The AEEE Conference intends to promote links between the university, regulators, and companies in the areas of Energy Economics, Environment, and Climate Change. In this fifteenth edition, the main theme of the Conference was “Energy Decarbonisation. From words to action”.

The head of EnergyEcoLab, Natalia Fabra, was one of the two keynote speakers of the conference. Her presentation [link], entitled, “The Energy Transition: Markets and Policies” summarised some of the results of the ongoing research carried out at EnergyEcoLab.

Web of the conference: link

Exhibition on Women in Science

Palabras de Natalia Fabra, Catedrática de Economía UC3M, en la inauguración de la exposición de “Mujeres que cambiaron el mundo” en la Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Link.

Ver noticia de la inaguración de la exposición aquí.

Ver vídeo de la exposición, elaborado por Marina Carrasco, estudiante de Periodismo y Comunicación Audiovisual de la UC3M aquí.

ERC Conference. Frontier Research: Creating Pathways to Sustainability

On 2-3 December 2019, the European Research Council organized its annual conference, this time entitled: Frontier Research: Creating Pathways to Sustainability.
The aim of the conference was to show the interdisciplinary work carried out by the ERC-funded researchers around the concept of “sustainability”. Among the topics that were discussed, the ERC highlighted the relevance of those research lines that help identify ways to achieve “Affordable and Clean Energy”. Demand for energy is increasing, and substantial investments are needed in innovative clean energy production and storage that can replace fossil fuels. There is a need for developing a broader portfolio of cost-effective renewable energy sources and technologies, including new solutions for energy storage, and innovative techniques for thermal insulation. At the same time, institutional and market design innovation is needed in order to create efficient carbon-free power markets.
Natalia Fabra, head of EnergyEcoLab, presented the main ongoing results of her ERC project ELECTRIC CHALLENGES. It was very inspiring to also listen to other researchers pushing in the same direction from very different angles. Prof. Giulia Grancini presented her project HY-NANO in which she aims to improve the efficiency of solar energy. Prof. Ballottari described his SOLENALGAE project on how microalgal cultures can be used as a source of renewable energy, via improving their photosynthetic solar energy conversion into chemical energy. Prof. Papakonstantinou presented his work in the project IntelGlazing which develops new technologies to reduce the level of heat-exchange through windows, thereby reducing the energy needed for regulating the temperature of buildings.
The whole video of the session can be seen here
Natalia Fabra’s lecture starts on min 9:42:40.

Debate on Ecological Economics organized by UC3M’s student association

The UC3M’s student association DEMOS organized a debate about Ecological Economics, open to the university community. Natalia Fabra, head of EnergyEcoLab, and Juan López de Uralde, ex-director of Greenpeace Spain and current Member of the Spanish Parliament, debated about the policies that need to be put in place in order to combat climate change. They stressed the need and urgency of climate action, which will entail economic, social and environmental benefits exceeding the costs of no action. Climate and energy policies need to take into account the distributional impacts, and compensate the negative impacts where needed. It is paramount that policy making is independent of lobby groups, which might delay policy implementation or distort it away of the common interest. They both acknowledged the effort of DEMOS and other associations, as they are key in mobilizing society and politics towards more ambitious climate action.