China is appraised to have the world's largest exploitable reserves of shale gas, although several legal, regulatory, environmental and investment-related issues will likely restrain its scope. China's capacity to successfully face these hurdles and produce commercial shale gas will have a...

The penetration of Variable Renewable Energies (VREs) in the electricity mix poses serious challenges in terms of management of the electrical grids, as the associated variability and non-dispatchability are in contrast with the requirement that the load be instantaneously equalized by the...

This study seeks to provide a clear and comprehensive overview on the various aspects related to the current status and the future prospects of renewable energy (namely solar and wind) in Southern and Eastern Mediterranean countries (SEMCs). In order to do so, the study will first provide a...

In creating a level playing field that facilitates the deployment of renewable energy technology (RET), the traditional energy policy regime based on eliminating RET's cost gaps versus fossil energy technology (FET) may be not sufficient. Building on an economic model of energy technology...

Energy efficiency is one of the key crossroads between energy, climate and economic issues. In fact, it represents one of the most cost effective ways to enhance security of energy supply, to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and to enhance economic competitiveness at one fell swoop. This...

Mitigation-Process Integrated Assessment Models (MP-IAMs) are used to analyze long-term transformation pathways of the energy system required to achieve stringent climate change mitigation targets. Due to their substantial temporal and spatial aggregation, IAMs cannot explicitly represent all...

The European Union has set ambitious targets for emission reduction and the penetration of renewable energy, including the electricity generation sector as one of the major emitters of CO2. After a period of subsidy-driven investments, the costs of renewables decreased strongly making...

Buildings’ heating represents an important share of the total energy consumption in Italy, and to reach the challenging decarbonization targets set by the EU by 2050, a combination of measures and technologies will be required. This working paper presents an analysis of different scenarios...

The availability of technology plays a major role in the feasibility and costs of climate policy. Nonetheless, technological change is highly uncertain and capital intensive, requiring risky efforts in research and development of clean energy technologies. In this paper, we introduce a two-track...

The diffusion of renewable energy in the power system implies high supply variability. Lacking economically viable storage options, renewable energy integration has so far been possible thanks to the presence of fast-reacting mid-merit fossil-based technologies, which act as back-up capacity....