EnergyEcoLab brings together a group of researchers committed to carrying out rigorous policy-relevant research in the area of Energy and Environmental Economics.

Using sound theoretical, empirical, and simulation tools, researchers at EnergyEcoLab explore market design and policy issues that arise in the transition to a low carbon economy. EnergyEcoLab is based at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, and has various links with researchers worldwide.

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Research lines

DEMAND FLEXIBILITY
Demand Flexibility

Assessing the efficiency and distributional consequences of dynamic electricity pricing.

RENEWABLES
Renewables

Studying the market impact of renewable energies.
Designing policies to induce efficient investments in renewables.

Electricity market simulations
Electricity Market Simulations

Simulating electricity market outcomes to identify the effects of policy and structural changes.

Health and Social Impacts
Health and Social Impacts

Understanding how cleaner energy can improve health and impact human behavior.

Energy Efficiency
Energy Efficiency

Exploring whether energy efficiency programmes deliver, and how to make them work better.

Storage
Storage

Understanding the effects of regulation and market structure on storage decisions.

Projects

ELECTRIC CHALLENGES is an ERC Consolidator Grant funded project led by Natalia Fabra at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Its main objective is to analyze regulatory and market-based solutions aimed at achieving the energy transition at least cost.

We propose to push out the frontier in the area of Energy and Environmental Economics by carrying out policy-relevant research on a pressing issue: how to achieve the low-carbon transition at least cost. In the context of electricity markets, some of the issues we will explore include: the potential to change households’ demand patterns through dynamic pricing, the scope for renewables to depress wholesale market prices, and the design and performance of the auctions for renewable investments. The project will run from September 2018 until September 2024.

Projects

  • The fight against climate change is one of world’s most pressing challenges.

  • The rise in global carbon concentration over the last decades is 10 times faster than any sustained rise in CO2 over the past 800.000 years.

  • Reducing carbon emissions is technically possible and economically desirable: what stops us from achieving it?

  • Setting out ambitious environmental targets is necessary, but equally important is to design cost-minimizing policies to achieve them.

  • Without cost-minimizing solutions, climate change policies will not get the societal and political support they need to succeed.

  • The power sector has a key role in limiting global emissions: transform renewable resources into energy that other polluting sectors can use.

  • Electricity markets open up exciting opportunities to expand our understanding of broad economic issues in great detail.

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