Energy efficiency in India: Achievements,challenges and legality

This paper explores the main legal Center enforced Commissions and Acts that are aimed at improving the current energy deficit in the country, with a specific emphasis on the need for research and a shift in the power market towards more sustainable technology. The paper first examines the main aims of the governmental 5 year plans in the past ten years, and then evaluates the merits and short comings of the existing technical framework that governs the Electrical Grid and Generation systems in the country. The paper also proposes inherent improvements, with ground scale methods in developing a sound and competitive system for power distribution through consumer and employee involvement as well as changes in the investment arena that can substantially alter the market compatibility of renewably generated energy. The paper indicates several key steps that the Center and State Governments have taken in order to revolutionise the feasibility of the electrical systems in the country. Finally, the paper appraises and assesses the main amendments in the Electrical Industry Legal literature and enforcement mechanisms that can effectuate rapid and systemic changes across the Indian context.     

The impact of a stimulus to energy efficiency on the economy and the environment: A regional computable general equilibrium analysis

Sustainable development is a key objective of UK national and regional policies. Improvements in resource productivity have been suggested as both a measure of progress towards sustainable development and as a means of achieving sustainability. Making ‘more with less’ intuitively seems to be good for the environment, and this is the presumption of current UK policy. However, in a system-wide context, improvements in energy efficiency lower the cost of energy in efficiency units and may even stimulate the consumption and production of energy measured in physical units, and increase pollution. Simulations of a computable general equilibrium model of Scotland suggest that an across the board stimulus to energy efficiency there would actually stimulate energy production and consumption and lead to a deterioration in environmental indicators. The implication is that policies directed at stimulating energy efficiency are not, in themselves, sufficient to secure environmental improvements: this may require the use of complementary energy policies designed to moderate incentives to increased energy consumption.     

Efficiency and economic benefit of dark-fermentative biohydrogen production in Asian circular economies: Evaluation using soft-link methodology with data envelopment analysis (DEA) and computable general equilibrium model (CGE)

This study combines a data envelopment analysis, a dynamic computable general equilibrium model with estimated secondary material flows for circular economy, based on economist Joseph Schumpeter's macroeconomic theory, to develop a novel soft-link model to determine the efficiency of forty-three dark-fermentative technology of biohydrogen, and technology improvement impacts on biohydrogen output and supply price for six major emerging Asian countries. The integrated model is found to be feasible.This study finds that efficiency of continuous technology significantly exceeds that of batch technology. Biomass substrate concentration is the most important input in the generation of biohydrogen statistically; pH influences the efficiency of the batch technology, and the efficiency of continuous production technologies significantly exceeds that of batch technologies, but still have a gap to improve to full production efficiency for most of continuous technologies. India and China generate highest output growth of biohydrogen in baseline scenario. Japan and India can most benefit from improvements in batch and continuous biohydrogen production technology. The models and results of this study provides guidelines and references for decision-makers in industry and government who are responsible for reforming future energy policy.     

Energy efficiency as a resource in state portfolio standards: Lessons for more expansive policies

In this paper, state electricity portfolio standards in the U.S. are analyzed to examine how energy efficiency is being created as a particular kind of resource through this type of climate change governance. Such policies can incentivize energy efficiency by requiring or encouraging electricity providers to meet a certain percentage of their demand through energy efficiency measures. North Carolina’s portfolio standard is used as an in-depth case study to identify factors that are then compared across all 36 states that include energy efficiency as part of a portfolio requirement or goal. The main finding of this study is that state portfolio standards tend to emphasize demand-side energy efficiency, or energy efficiency on the customer’s side of the electricity meter, and only rarely incentivize a full range of both demand-side and supply-side efficiency changes. As a result, the amount of energy efficiency and climate change mitigation benefits that are likely to result from this type of portfolio standard policy tool are limited. From this analysis, lessons are drawn out for crafting stronger portfolio standards that incentivize a wider range of efficiency changes across electricity networks.     

Energy intensity and economic performance in small scale bricks and foundry clusters in India: does energy intensity matter?

This paper probes energy intensity and economic performance in small enterprises with reference to two energy-intensive small-scale industry (SSI) clusters in the state of Karnataka in India. Based on analysis of primary data collected from 38 bricks enterprises and 31 foundries, the paper brought out that there is a positive relationship not only between energy intensity and share of energy cost in total variable cost but also between energy intensity and value of output. But there is a negative relationship between energy intensity and factor productivities. Energy made a statistically significant contribution to economic performance in terms of returns to scale. Those small enterprises, which were less energy intensive, achieved higher returns to scale than those, which were more energy intensive. Therefore, it is imperative for Indian Policy Makers to include ‘energy efficiency improvement’ programmes as part of the strategy for enhancing SSI competitiveness.     

An evaluation of energy-environment-economic efficiency for EU,APEC and ASEAN countries: Design of a Target-Oriented DFM model with fixed factors in Data Envelopment Analysis

This paper aims to offer an advanced assessment methodology for sustainable national energy-environment-economic efficiency strategies, based on an extended Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). The use of novel efficiency-improving approaches based on DEA originates from the so-called Distance Friction Minimisation (DFM) method. To design a feasible improvement strategy for low-efficiency DMUs, we develop here a Target-Oriented (TO) DFM model. However, in many real-world cases input factors may not be flexibly adjusted in the short run. In this study, we integrate the TO-DFM model with a fixed (inflexible) factor (FF) approach to cope with such more realistic circumstances. Super-efficiency DEA is next used in our comparative study on the efficiency assessment of energy-environment-economic targets for the EU, APEC and ASEAN (A&A) countries, employing appropriate data sets from the years 2003 to 2012. We consider two inputs (primary energy consumption and population) and two outputs (CO₂ and GDP), including a fixed input factor (viz. population). On the basis of our DEA analysis results, EU countries appear to exhibit generally a higher efficiency than A&A countries. The above-mentioned TO-DFM-FF projection model is able to address realistic circumstances and requirements in an operational sustainability strategy for efficiency improvement in inefficient countries in the A&A region.