The use of “Bonus-Malus†schemes for promoting energy-efficient household appliances: a case study for Spain

Subsidies to promote the purchase of energy-efficient household appliances have been extensively used in many countries. This paper deals with the case of the Spanish rebate scheme, and proposes the use of both subsidies and taxes as a more effective way of promoting efficient appliances. The authors propose a sophisticated methodology for designing optimal combinations of taxes and subsides depending on different policy goals such as budget neutrality, increasing the proportion of efficient appliances, etc.