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The purpose of this paper is to analyse altering energy demand patterns and energy factor substitution possibilities over time in the pulp and paper industry in order to increase our understanding of suitable policy options for increasing energy efficiency. The investigation employs a flexible translog cost function and an unbalanced panel data set covering 32 pulp and paper mills over the time period 1974-2005 in Sweden. Specifically, we test whether energy factor demand patterns in the industry for the period 1974-1990 differ from those during the latter period, 1991-2005. The empirical results reveal that even though the Swedish pulp and paper industry is relatively insensitive to changes in energy factor input prices in the short run, we find evidence of significant changes over time. According to the results, the own-price sensitivity of fuel has increased since the 1970s and the 1980s, thus indicating that fuel demand has become more sensitive to short-run changes in relative prices. The estimated cross-price elasticities between electricity and fuel also support the hypothesis of increased substitutability over time. However, the null hypothesis of an equal own-price elasticity of electricity demand across the two time periods cannot be rejected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are large differences between paper mills in, e.g. feedstock use and grades produced, but typical processes are similar in all mills. The aim of this study is to benchmark the specific energy consumption (SEC) of similar processes within different paper mills in order to identify energy improvement potentials at process level. We have defined improvement potentials as measures that can be taken at mill/process level under assumed fixed inputs and outputs. We were able to use industrial data on detailed process level, and we conducted energy benchmarking comparisons in 23 Dutch paper mills. We calculated average SECs per process step for different paper grades, and we were able to identify ranges in SECs between mills producing the same grade. We found significant opportunities for energy efficiency improvement in the wire and press section as well as in the drying section. The total energy improvement potential based on identified best practices in these sections was estimated at 5.4 PJ (or 15 % of the total primary energy use in the selected mills). Energy use in the other processes was found to be too dependent on quality and product specifications to be able to quantify improvement potentials. Our results emphasise that even a benchmark on detailed process level does not lead to clear estimations of energy improvement potentials without accounting for structural effects and without having a decent understanding of the process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a growing research literature focused on ‘invisible energy policy’ that explores the complex links between policies in non-energy sectors and energy demand. Invisible energy policies are those that do not include energy as a visible policy objective but still pose implications for energy demand that are largely unrecognised in non-energy organisational settings. Within this innovative area of analysis, to date, little attention has been paid to how ‘energy’ features in the discourse of non-energy contexts. This paper makes a distinctive contribution by examining how energy issues, such as energy demand, travel, and energy skills, do or do not feature in the policy and wider strategy of a non-energy policy setting. The research focuses on the content of policies and other documents in the non-energy policy context of UK secondary schooling, using a case study approach. It aimed to identify how energy surfaces and/or remains absent in different types of documentary evidence at the school. The textual analysis shows how openings for energy to surface as a concern at the school are often heavily bounded in specific policy areas, such as sustainability and education. It also foregrounds the lack of recognition in the sample for how school operations and strategy can produce demand for energy more fundamentally. It argues that these openings for energy to surface can provide points of negotiation to discuss the more fundamental energy impacts of policy. The paper concludes by reflecting on the analysis’ implications for research on ‘invisible energy policies’ and low-carbon transitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It was last estimated that in 2020, data centers comprised approximately 2% of total US electricity consumption, with an estimated annual growth rate of 4%. As our country increasingly relies on information technology (IT), our data centers (DCs) will need to increase their energy efficiency (EE) to stabilize their energy consumption. The task of studying EE in DCs is complicated by the interconnected nature of humans and mission-critical technical systems. Moreover, the literature tends to focus on technology solutions such as improvements to IT equipment, cooling infrastructure, and software, without addressing organizational and psychological drivers. Our research demystifies the complex interactions between humans and DCs, by asking What non-technical barriers impede EE investment decision-making and/or implementing energy management strategies? To begin to answer this question, we perform a literature review of 86 resources, ranging from peer-reviewed journal publications to handbooks. We also consider related fields such as organizational behavioral management and energy intensive buildings. We develop a public Zotero library, perform content coding, and complete a rudimentary network analysis. Our findings from the literature review suggest that (1) technological solutions are abundant in the literature but fall short of providing practical guidance on the pitfalls of implementation, (2) making energy efficiency a priority at the executive level of organizations will be largely ineffective if the IT and facilities staff are not directly incentivized to increase EE, and (3) there is minimal current understanding of how the individual psychologies of IT and facilities staff affect EE implementation in DCs. In the next phase of our research, we plan to interview data center operators/experts to ground-truth our literature findings and collaboratively design decarbonization policy solutions that target organizational structure, empower individual staff, and foster a supportive external market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This short communication introduces the special issue based on a selection of papers first presented at the International Energy Policy and Programme Evaluation Conference in Berlin on 9 to 11 September 2014. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the relationship between energy consumption and economic development using yearly data from various demographic, economic, and geographic country groups worldwide. The study examines this link at both an aggregated and per-country basis to reduce potential bias. Additionally, the paper explores the possibility of an asymmetric effect between energy usage and economic performance. The results suggest that an increase in energy usage tends to boost economic output while a decrease in energy usage does not significantly impact most of the studied groups and countries. The findings are presented through maps and tabulated data for readers to visualize and explore in detail. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the link between energy consumption and economic performance, with the goal of determining whether an asymmetric effect exists. The data used in this study is comprised of yearly information from different demographic, economic, and geographic country groups worldwide. The methodology involves both aggregated and per-country analyses to reduce potential bias. The study finds that an increase in energy usage tends to boost economic output, while a decrease in energy usage does not significantly impact most of the studied groups and countries. The findings are presented visually through maps and in detail through tabulated data. The results of this study provide insight into the relationship between energy consumption and economic development and indicate the existence of an asymmetric effect. The study finds that an increase in energy usage tends to boost economic output while a decrease in energy usage does not significantly impact most of the studied groups and countries. The findings are presented through maps and tabulated data, which offer a visual representation of the results and allow for further exploration. Based on these findings, policymakers may consider promoting an increase in energy usage to stimulate economic growth. Additionally, the study highlights the importance of considering an asymmetric effect when examining the relationship between energy consumption and economic performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the perspective of market segmentation, this paper empirically tests the impact mechanism of market segmentation on energy efficiency by using China's provincial panel data from 2005 to 2016. The results show that market segmentation has a significant inhibitory effect on energy efficiency by distorting technological progress, scale efficiency, and allocation efficiency. The conclusion of this paper not only provides an important theoretical basis for promoting the reform of China's economic system, but also brings some enlightenment for other developing countries to choose ways to improve energy efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Decomposition analysis is a proven approach to highlight the trends in energy economics and to clarify the changing factors in energy consumption. In Turkey, industrial sector is one of the major drivers of economy, which accounts for 32% of the final energy consumption. This paper uses the logarithmic mean Divisia index (LMDI) to divide the total energy consumption growth of ten Turkish manufacturing industries into activity effect, structure effect, and intensity effect in the period from 2005 to 2014. Manufacturing subsectors consist of (a) food products, beverages, and tobacco, (b) textile and textile products, (c) wood and wood products, (d) pulp, paper, and paper products; publishing and printing, (e) chemicals, chemical products, and man-made fibers, (f) rubber and plastic products, (g) non-metallic mineral products, (h) primary metals, (i) equipment goods, and (j) other manufacturing. Energy consumption of total manufacturing industry rose from 25,013 ktoe to 27,590 ktoe within the period. The subsector (a), (b), (c), (d), (e), (f), and (i) analyses results reveal that the activity effect has significant contribution to energy consumption, while structure and intensity effects are negligible. On the other hand, for the energy-intensive industries, influence of structure and intensity effects has observed simultaneously. The results also show that intensity and activity effects follow similar trends. Energy intensity of manufacturing industry has followed a slightly decreasing route (0.288 ktoe/$2005 in 2005 and 0.219 ktoe/$2005 in 2014) in the period, which is an indicative of contribution of activity changes, energy efficient technologies, and other energy efficiency efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy efficiency, coupled with distributed renewable generation, is not only relevant to decrease the energy consumption and environmental emissions, but is also a large opportunity in terms of job creation and development of new business areas that stimulate investment (foreign and national). Moreover, energy efficiency and off-grid systems are a cost-effective strategy for a fast increase the number of people with energy access, as well as a way to fulfil the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals no. 7 by 2030. In Mozambique, in 2020, despite the significant efforts made by national authorities, only 32% of the inhabitants have access to electricity services. This paper presents an overview on the Mozambique electricity sector (grid-connected and off-grid) and how electric mobility, digitalization and energy efficiency may help the country to increase its electricity access rate. A characterization of Mozambique renewable energy potential per energy source, as well as the energy-efficient technology options in each sector, is carried out. Additionally, several key actions to improve energy access and to promote energy efficiency in Mozambique are also addressed. A variety of projects and key actions, addressing both the supply side and the demand side, is presented within this paper, supported by tailored policies and programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy Efficiency is an international journal dedicated to research topics connected to energy with a focus on end-use efficiency issues. In 2018, the journal celebrates its 10th anniversary. In order to mark it and analyze not only how the journal has been performing over the years, but also which are the trends for academic debate and research in this journal, this article presents a bibliometric overview of the publication and citation structure of the journal during period 2008-2017. The study relies on the Web of Science Core Collection and the Scopus database to collect the bibliographic results. Additionally, the work exploits the visualization of similarities (VOS) viewer software to map graphically the bibliographic material. The research analyses the most cited papers and the most popular keywords. Moreover, the paper studies how the journal connects with other international journals and identifies the most productive authors, institutions, and countries. The results indicate that the journal has rapidly grown over the years, obtained a merited position in the scientific community, with contributions from authors all over the world (with Europe as the most productive region). Moreover, the journal has focused so far mainly on energy efficiency issues in close relationship with policies and incentives, corporate energy efficiency, consumer behavior, and demand-side management programs, with both industrial, building and transport sectors widely involved. Our discussion concludes with suggested future research avenues, in particular towards coordinated efforts from different disciplines (technical, economic, and sociopsychological ones) to address the emerging energy efficiency challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the transportation energy efficiency of Yangtze River Delta's 15 cities is studied in the period from 2009 to 2013. To measure transportation's dynamic performance, the window analysis of data envelopment analysis (DEA) is used to estimate the efficiency in cross-sectional and time-varying data. Capital inputs and labor inputs are selected as the two non-energy inputs, energy consumption as the energy input, passenger volume and freight volume are selected as the two desirable outputs, and carbon dioxide is chosen as the undesirable output. The empirical study shows that Shanghai had the highest transportation energy efficiency, followed by Zhejiang province, and the average efficiency of Jiangsu province was the worst. A regression analysis on the efficiency values and their three influencing factors was carried out. The results show that per capita gross domestic product and the per capita area of paved roads in a city negatively influenced the efficiency values, while the number of public transportation vehicles per 10,000 persons positively influenced the transportation efficiency values. Lastly, some policy recommendations, conclusions, and suggestions for further research are given. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The UK introduced carbon budgets in 2008, with an aim to reduce greenhouse gases by 80% by 2050 compared with the 1990 levels. It has been argued that the 2015 Paris Agreement on limiting the global average temperature rise to 'well below 2° C' requires deeper and more rapid emission reductions than the current UK targets. Household energy consumption accounts for almost a third of total UK CO2 emissions in recent years. This paper explores drivers of high energy consumption in domestic buildings from a sociological practice perspective and through a lens of dominant meanings of 'home'. Whilst the practice approach and meanings of home have been explored separately in the literature to understand household energy consumption, this paper adds new findings on the interaction between the meanings of home and the elements of practices. Results show the dominant meaning of home differs between householders; this in turn affects the materials and procedures of energy-consuming practices. For instance, if 'home' means 'hospitality', this changes the standard of comfort and convenience people perceive at home. Understanding how practices and meanings of the home intersect, provides new, much needed insights that could support policy change commensurate with more rapidly reducing CO2 emissions from domestic energy consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assuming that economic policy uncertainty (EPU) can significantly affect economic activities, the paper explored the nature of its effect on energy consumption in G7 countries (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK, and the USA) over the period 1997–2019 using a panel nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model. The presence of an asymmetric effect of EPU on energy consumption was tested by decomposing EPU into negative and positive changes and placing it in a multivariate setting. The results reveal that the asymmetric effect of EPU on energy consumption is limited to the short run. However, if energy policy fails to manage uncertainty, it could become significant in the long run. Energy consumption is statistically significantly affected by economic institutions and income in both the short and the long run. Higher real income per capita boosts energy consumption in the short run, but like energy technology innovation, it reduces energy consumption in the long run. In contrast, more economic freedom, which was used as a proxy for institutions, increases energy consumption regardless of the time frame. The results point to the energy policy challenges associated with energy consumption and sustainable energy practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is extremely significant to construct a scientific and accurate forecasting model for energy consumption of the USA, because it could help to formulate energy policies and allocate energy resources. In recent years, more and more hybrid models based on divided-and-conquer method have been applied in energy consumption prediction to obtain satisfactory results. However, owning to the obvious enhancing effect of decomposition methods, the issue concerning seasonal fluctuation existed in time series is rarely considered before modeling. It is a fact that seasonality indeed influences the performance of prediction. This paper proposes a hybrid forecasting model for energy consumption, which combines seasonal adjustment method, ensemble empirical mode decomposition (EEMD), echo state network (ESN), and grasshopper optimization algorithm (GOA). The seasonal adjustment method that inherits the idea of divide and conquer is used to decompose original time series into only two parts including seasonal subseries and remainder subseries rather than regular three parts(seasonality, trend, and residual) for avoiding the complex modeling task of the residual subseries. Then models ESN and EEMD-GOA-ESN are utilized to model and predict the seasonal subseries and remainder subseries respectively. Finally, two parts are summed to generate the final predictive results. The empirical studies of fossil fuels, nuclear electric power, and renewable energy consumptions show that the proposed model outperforms other alternative benchmarks with regard to effectiveness and scalability. Besides, the sample extrapolation forecasting displays that the technique could limit the error of monthly energy consumption to 3.3%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Islands and remote rural communities throughout the USA pay some of the highest costs for electricity and heating fuel in the nation. For areas with such high energy costs, the benefits of energy efficiency can be significant but rural residents face several geographic, financial, and awareness barriers that make it difficult to invest in home energy upgrades. These barriers combine to create a market failure that we call the "rural energy efficiency gap." The existence of the rural efficiency gap is supported by data collected from Alaska, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont which indicate that the "energy burden," or percentage of household income spent on energy bills, is 33% higher in rural areas and that participation in residential energy efficiency financing and rebate programs can be significantly lower. The combination of higher energy burdens and greater barriers to participation can lead to inequitable distribution of available resources for energy efficiency, meaning that those who could benefit most from efficiency upgrades are often least able to access them. This work is designed to be a resource for energy efficiency program administrators but may also be of interest to energy efficiency program implementers, policymakers, and regulators. It provides data about the rural energy efficiency gap and identifies barriers to energy efficiency in rural communities. It also highlights strategies that are helping to bridge the gap by making it easier for residents in cold climate, petroleum-dependent states—those with high thermal energy burdens—to increase comfort and safety in their homes while also reducing energy bills. The barriers to rural energy efficiency identified in this paper have been grouped into three categories: geographic barriers, financial barriers, and awareness and access barriers. There are many differences between rural areas across the country, e.g., demographics, utility model and rate structures, energy sources, and consumption patterns. This paper is not intended to suggest that the strategies documented here will necessarily be applicable to all rural areas in the USA [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on non-radial directional distance function, this paper measures the provincial total factor energy efficiency in China during the period from 2000 to 2015. And then, this paper analyzes the stage characteristics and driving forces of energy efficiency convergence based on the improving of traditional beta-convergence model. The empirical results confirm that there is a significant absolute beta-convergence trend of energy efficiency from 2000 to 2015 in China. However, the convergence trend of energy efficiency has obvious stage characteristics. Before 2006, energy efficiency has a significant convergence trend, but it is characterized by divergence after 2006. Technological progress significantly promotes the convergence of regional energy efficiency before 2006. During the period from 2006 to 2015, the industrial restructuring accelerates the speed of energy efficiency divergence. Conclusively, this paper offers pieces of objective and reasonable policy advice according to the conclusions mentioned above. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investments in industrial energy efficiency are essential for meeting future energy needs. Nevertheless, the industrial sector's current efforts in energy efficiency investments are insufficient. Additional benefits of energy efficiency investments have been suggested to improve the financial attractiveness of energy efficiency investments. Yet, previous research indicates that not all benefits are included when investment opportunities are evaluated, leading to an underestimation of what a firm will gain from the investment. Additionally, previous research lacks conceptual frameworks for describing these additional benefits at an early stage in the investment process. Moreover, various benefit terms are found in currently existing research, but there are a lack of definitions and distinctions attributed to these terms. Therefore, this paper provides a systematic review on the benefit terms of energy efficiency investments, establishes non-energy benefits as the term most relevant for such investments and provides a new definition of the concept. Further, a new framework for categorising non-energy benefits to enable them to be included during the investment process is developed, in which the level of quantifiability and time frame of the non-energy benefits are taken into account. Including non-energy benefits in the investment process can make energy efficiency investments more attractive and increase their priority against other investments. Moreover, non-energy benefits can reinforce drivers as well as counterbalance known barriers to energy efficiency investments. Acknowledging non-energy benefits can thus contribute to an increased adoption level for energy efficiency investments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chinese coal enterprises are facing severe challenges due to low-carbon economy requirements and capacity reductions. This paper adopts a dynamic SBM model to compare the mining efficiency of each mining area of a coal company in China. We use total excavation footage, number of working platforms, and machine quantities as input indicators, and coal sales and CO2 emissions as output indicators. It was found that (1) both high efficiency and low efficiency mines maintained their production status each year and did not actively improve over time; (2) energy consumption was the primary indicator affecting comprehensive mining efficiency; and (3) while changes in the market environment did not have any significant impact on coal mining efficiency, coal mine characteristics were found to have some correlations with efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reviews the empirical literature that provides a correlation between the different barriers to energy efficiency and consumer behavior related to two domains. It evaluates behavior related to energy curtailment, which represents routine, repetitive effort to decrease consumption on a day-to-day basis. It also considers behavior related to investments, which are one time actions such as purchasing new energy efficiency technologies. The paper also reviews the existing literature that assesses the effect of policies on energy use and investment in energy efficiency technologies. By surveying the relevant research, this paper has two objectives. First, it discusses the impact of different barriers on energy efficiency, and second, it combines policy interventions with barriers related to both energy use and investment in energy efficiency technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the European Union (EU), mandatory durability ecodesign requirements have recently been set for some products, including lighting products; further development of durability standards is also expected in the future. Durability standards can bring environmental and consumer benefits, but the question remains about what optimal durability is. In this paper, the product lifetime aspect of durability is considered, and optimal lifetimes in relation to least life cycle cost (LCC) for the consumer are analysed. The paper focusses the analysis on a case of LED lamps available in an online market in December 2016 and models optimal lifetimes from an LCC perspective. The statistical error of the regression does not allow for calculation of the optima with precision, but the calculation indicates optimal lifetime is close to 25,000 hours. The influence of smaller discount rates and more intensive use of the product are also modelled, which indicate that durability is desirable in intense-use scenarios in particular. The usefulness of the method is discussed and the findings are compared to previous literature and studies examining durability and increased lifetimes for products, including those using an alternative approach of life cycle assessment (LCA). The initial results of this LCC method indicate that longer lifetimes than those currently required by legal standards in the EU could be appropriate for LED lamps. As such, the advantages and disadvantages of different policy instruments to stimulate increased durability are also discussed. The paper concludes with suggestions for potential future research and further policy development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing energy efficiency and savings will play a key role in the achievement of the climate and energy targets in the European Union (EU). To meet the EU's objectives for greenhouse gas emission reductions, renewable energy use and energy efficiency improvements, its member states have implemented and will design and implement various energy policies. This paper reviews a range of scientific articles on the topic of policy instruments for energy efficiency and savings and evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of different measures. The review demonstrates the variety of possible instruments and points to the complex policy environment, in which not a single instrument can meet the respective energy efficiency targets, but which requires a combination of multiple instruments. Therefore, the paper in particular focuses on assessing potential interactions between combinations of energy efficiency policies, i.e. the extent to which the different instruments counteract or support one another. So far, the literature on energy efficiency policy has paid only limited attention to the effect of interacting policies. This paper reviews and analyses interaction effects thus far identified with respect to factors that determine the interaction. Drawing on this review, we identify cases for interaction effects between energy efficiency policies to assess their potential existence systematically and to show future research needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Domestic hot water production is the second most important energy use in the European residential sector, nowadays accounting for 14% of the sector's total final energy consumption. Despite its importance, the energy efficiency improvement rates for domestic hot water are lower than for other residential energy services, hence calling for energy-saving measures. One key measure is to install flow restrictors. Their advantages are the low upfront cost, easy installation, and suitability for integration into energy efficiency programs. Focusing on flow restrictors, this paper presents different methods for quantifying the energy savings using ex-ante and ex-post approaches: deemed savings (DES), dedicated measurements (DMs), and monthly and yearly billing analysis (SMBA and ABA). These methods were tested using information based on measurements (water flow, temperatures), historical billing analysis, a survey among inhabitants, and interviews with field experts. While measurements made at individual faucets or showerheads show significant water savings (20% and 33% respectively), energy savings associated with hot water production in the boiler (final energy) are significantly lower (around 10%) but far from being negligible. The main reasons for the difference are thermal losses related to hot water distribution in central heating systems, usages not affected by flow restrictors, and inhabitants removing them. We conclude that flow restrictors offer promising potential for short- to medium-term implementation. Given the simplicity of this solution, we recommend including it systematically in energy efficiency programs, as well as implementing a ban on fixtures with flow rates beyond a predefined level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The heating requirements for district heating systems decrease sharply during the summer in China, which leads to the heating capacity of these systems remaining idle. To make full use of district heating systems, a novel approach for application of these thermal systems to cooling is proposed in this paper. The proposed system is based on a distributed absorption cooling (DAC) system driven by heat from the combined heat and power system. To investigate its energy-saving effects, the energy efficiency of the proposed DAC system was researched using the primary energy saving ratio (FESR) method. To assess the economic feasibility of the proposed system, the equivalent heating price for this DAC system was derived using economic analysis methods. The weight analysis method was used to analyse the factors affecting the energy efficiency of the DAC system. The research results showed that the energy efficiency and the economic feasibility of the proposed DAC system can be improved by increasing the heating-driven cooling efficiency. A new DAC system (IDAC) was then proposed based on integration of DAC with a heat-driven liquid desiccant dehumidifier (LDD), and the results show that the new system can increase the heating-driven cooling efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Primary aluminium production is energy- and GHG-intensive in which electrolysis is by far the most energy- and GHG-intensive process. This paper's aim is to study the effects on (1) primary energy use, (2) GHG emissions and (3) energy and CO2 costs when energy end-use efficiency measures are implemented in the electrolysis. Significant savings in final and primary energy use, GHG emissions and energy and CO2 costs can be achieved by implementing the studied measures. Vertical electrode cells and the combination of inert anodes and wettable cathodes are among the measures with the highest savings in all three areas (primary energy use, GHG emissions and energy and CO2 costs). Direct carbothermic reduction is one of the measures with the highest savings in primary energy use and energy and CO2 costs. For GHG emissions, direct carbothermic reduction is the more beneficial choice in regions with a high proportion of coal power, while inert anodes are the more beneficial choice in regions with a high proportion of low-carbon electricity. Although a company potentially can save more money by implementing the direct carbothermic reduction, the company should consider implementing the vertical electrode cells together with other energy-saving technologies since this would yield the largest GHG emission savings while providing similar cost savings as the direct carbothermic reduction. It may be necessary to impose a price on GHG emissions in order to make inert anodes cost-effective on their own, although further evaluations are needed in this regard. There is a potential to achieve carbon-neutrality in the reduction of aluminium oxide to pure aluminium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is little concrete understanding of the energy consumption of refrigerating appliances during normal use or the main influences on their energy consumption. To date, no widely accepted method to disaggregate measured energy consumption measured in the home into its key components has been demonstrated. This paper examines the main external factors that impact on the energy consumption of existing refrigerating appliances in the home and how they respond to changing conditions, namely: room air temperature, defrosting behaviour and user interactions. Analysis of field data from 235 homes in Australia demonstrates that room air temperature is by far the largest factor accounting for typically around 75% of total energy consumption. Where present, energy used for defrosting is relatively small at around 10%, but this does vary by household and the type of defrost controller. User interactions typically account for 15% of total energy consumed by main household refrigerating appliances, but this varies from a few percent to as much as 45% in large households. The method set out in this paper provides a basis for more in depth analysis and a better understanding of energy consumption of household refrigerators in different regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As many countries and regions have started large-scale deployment of smart meters, there is a growing amount of data on electricity use available for energy efficiency services. We have developed a novel tool that, based on smart meter data, automatically generates customised energy-saving advice to commercial and industrial customers. This type of audit tool could enormously expand the target of energy audits to almost all small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with smart metering at a low cost per customer. In this paper, we explain the structure of and approaches that we used in our prototype tool, such as fault detection, energy disaggregation, social comparison and benchmarking and selective visualisation. We also show test case results for the tool by using smart meter data from 34 public buildings in Japan. While the prototype tool presented in this paper has some limitations, the approach and the basic structure of the tool are valuable and provide the basis for more sophisticated tools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the beginning of 2016, Colombia was experiencing an energy shortage, and in order to avoid mandatory power cuts, the government launched an unexpected hybrid price/non-price energy-saving policy. In this paper, I evaluate how low-income households in a major Colombian city respond to this policy. Using hourly household electricity consumption data, I find that, on average, households reduce electricity consumption by 4.5% as a result of the policy. It is striking that even lowincome households, who consume relatively small amounts of electricity, respond to energy-saving policies and engage in conservation behaviors in the short term. In my analysis, I also find that the effect is stronger the higher the household pre-treatment electricity consumption levels and smaller among poorer households. However, the heterogeneity in terms of income level vanishes once I control for household pre-program electricity consumption levels. Finally, my point estimates are comparable to the impact estimates of policies that are similar to the one I analyze in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions generally aim to (i) reduce energy use and hence emissions, (ii) steer consumers away from fossil fuels and/or electricity generated from fossil fuels, and (iii) align demand and supply, making sure that the existing infrastructure can handle times of high demand. Policies thus include a variety of pricing schemes, taxes on energy inputs, energy efficiency standards and incentives, and renewables standards and incentives. Ex ante and ex post analyses of their effectiveness thus rely crucially on understanding how consumers respond to pricing schemes, taxes, and other policies. This paper presents an overview of the challenges faced when empirically estimating household energy demand. It describes the difficulties associated with estimating the price elasticity of demand, discussing behavioral responses that may make consumers relatively insensitive to price changes or taxes. It also surveys empirical evidence about nonprice policies, such as clearer information or real-time feedback about energy use, and appeal to norms. The paper concludes discussing evidence about the rebound effect, the energy efficiency gap, and how suppliers respond to a variety of policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plenty of technical norms, included in the EPBD umbrella, assesses the performance of buildings or its sub-systems in terms of efficiency. In particular, EN 15316 and its sub-sections determine the efficiency factors of a space heating system. This paper focuses on the estimation of efficiency factors for hydronic panel radiators. The assessment of efficiency factors occurs by evaluating the amount of heat emitted from the heat emitter and the thermal losses towards building envelope. A factor that influences the heat emitted is the location of radiator connection pipes. Connection pipes can be located on opposite side or at the same side of the radiator. To better estimate the heat emitted from the radiator with different location of connection pipes, a transient model with multiple storage elements is implemented in a commercial building simulation software and validated versus available experimental measurements. Sensitivity analysis encompasses the variations of heat losses due to the building location in different climates, the changing of the active thermal mass and the type of radiator local control. The final outcome of this paper is a practical support where designers and researchers can easily assess the efficiency factors for space heating system equipped with hydronic panel radiators of buildings located in Sweden. As main results, (i) the efficiency factor for control is higher in Northern climates (Luleå) than in Southern climates (Gothenburg), (ii) heavy-weight active thermal masses allow higher efficiency factors than light active thermal masses, and (iii) connection pipes located on the same side of the hydronic panel radiator enable higher efficiency factors than pipes located on opposite side. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an effective policy instrument to reduce energy consumption and CO emissions, the effects of fuel taxation on income distribution have been the critical factor that determines whether a fuel tax could be acceptable in China. This paper estimates the distributional effects of a fuel tax on households in various income groups by using the input-output model. Results indicate that the total distributional effects of fuel taxes are moderately progressive; that is, high-income households would bear more tax burden compared to low-income households. In addition, the indirect effects are larger than the direct effects. Moreover, the Kakwani and Suits indices show that fuel excise taxes are progressive, implying that a fuel tax could improve the unfair income distribution. In order to reduce the negative impact of fuel taxes on low-income households, it is necessary for the government to design a reasonable redistribution mechanism of tax revenue or adopt compensatory measures such as the transfer payments targeted on low-income groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the issue of aviation carbon emissions has caused wide public concern. How to measure airline performance under the premise of considering aviation carbon emissions has become a hot issue. In this paper, airline energy efficiency is divided into three stages as follows: operations, services, and sales. A network range-adjusted measure with unified natural and managerial disposability model is proposed to calculate the environmental efficiencies of 29 airlines from 2008 to 2015. We get some interesting results. (1) Scandinavian has the highest overall efficiency among these 29 airlines during 2008–2015. (2) For the other 28 airlines, the improvement of the undesirable outputs is not the most urgent work to improve overall efficiency. (3) The overall efficiency has no obvious fluctuation in this period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the key challenges to greater renewable electricity supplies is the temporal mismatch between non-dispatchable renewable sources and peaks in electricity demand. In addition, increased electrification coupled with the de-carbonisation of electricity generation is likely to increase the scale of demand peaks. This could force investment in carbon-intensive peaker generation or capital intensive storage capacity as well as additional transmission and distribution network capacity which may then be substantially underutilised. Whilst considerable effort has been devoted to testing a range of demand response interventions to reduce or shift consumption, less attention has been given to the ability of certain appliances to permanently reduce demand at peak through energy efficiency. In this paper, we use a published model of future energy-efficient lighting uptake together with multi-year measured lighting demand data from a sample of residential households to model the potential power (MW) and energy (MWh) reductions of a 'business as usual' rate of efficient lighting adoption. Our estimates suggest that whilst lighting comprises ~ 4% of overall New Zealand annual electricity consumption, it comprises up to 12% of evening peak electricity consumption in winter. As a result, we estimate that by 2029, more efficient residential lighting could reduce New Zealand's total annual demand by 1 TWh and reduce the highest winter evening peaks (at 17:00) by at least 500 MW (9%). The winter evening demand reduction would be roughly equivalent to avoiding the need for additional generation capacity of the scale of New Zealand's Huntly Power Stations 1–4 (coal/gas) plus the Stratford peaker plant (gas open-cycle) and has clear implications for any electricity system that is intending to transition towards ~ 100% renewable generation at least cost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many studies show that the human energy-related behaviors have a significant impact on the return of Energy Efficiency Programs (EEPs). However, studies that aimed at increasing the energy savings from the EEPs are still limited. In this paper, a Genetic Agent-Based (GAB) framework has been proposed to enhance the return of a typical EEP by simulating social network and energy behavior attributes and finding the best participants among a target community. Several attributes are considered for creating the agent-based model of households and numerically representing their interactions with the EEP or within their social network. The improvement of the EEP using the GAB framework is tested on a social network consisting of 56 households. The simulation results show that by accurately selecting participants using the presented framework, the amount of energy saving could increase up to ten times. This ultimately indicates the considerable impact of the social network on the EEP performance. In other words, to have an efficient EEP in the long term, the social network attributes such as network degree and strength of connections should be also considered in decision-making along with the energy-related attributes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The building sector contributes significantly to global energy consumption and CO2 emissions. It is urgent to reduce them through the retrofit of the current building stock and improvements in new building designs. The energy performance contracts that can deliver energy consumption savings must have an attractive rate of return to make financial sense for public and private sector buildings. These contracts must also have a wide uptake in the market to improve significantly the energy performance of the building stock. This paper develops a hybrid bottom up and system dynamics modelling framework to: (1) explore the diffusion of energy performance contracts and its effect on operational building energy consumption and (2) facilitate integration into policy making. The bottom up modelling component is used to provide estimates of potential operational building energy use savings. The estimates are the input to the system dynamics diffusion model which is used to explore diffusion pathways of energy performance contracts. The framework will facilitate scenario and policy analysis for the diffusion of the contracts on the building stock and their potential impact on energy consumption and associated CO2 emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As data centers proliferate, their energy intensity deserves close attention. Always-on operations and growing usage for cloud and other backend processes make servers the fundamental driver of data center energy use. Yet servers' power draw under real-world conditions is poorly understood. This paper explores characteristics of volume servers that affect energy use, quantifying differences in power draw between higher-performing Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation (SPEC) and ENERGY STAR servers and that of a typical server. First, we establish general characteristics of the US installed base, before reporting hardware configurations from a major online retail website. We then compare idle power across three datasets (one unique to this paper) and explain their differences via the hardware characteristics to which power draw is most sensitive. We find idle server power demand to be significantly higher than benchmarks from ENERGY STAR and the industry-released SPEC database, and SPEC server configurations—and likely their power scaling—to be atypical of volume servers. Next, we examine power draw trends among high-performing servers across their load range to consider whether these trends are representative of volume servers, before inputting average idle power load values into a recent national server energy use model. Lastly, results from two surveys of IT professionals illustrate the incidence of more efficient equipment and operational practices in server rooms/closets. Future work should include server power field measurements in data centers of different sizes, accounting for variations in configurations and setting changes post-purchase, as well as investigating the linkage between time and server energy efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Basic insulation and heating system retrofits of existing homes could achieve annual energy savings of up to $4–5 billion in the USA. However, current US utility energy efficiency (EE) programs are costly and challenging to scale. Customer acquisition occurs primarily through energy bill mailers, mass media, and on-line advertising that lack specificity about particular home retrofit opportunities, expected energy savings, and cost-effectiveness. Specific retrofit opportunities are identified via on-site home energy assessments that can be inconvenient to homeowners, expensive, and of variable accuracy. Our paper discusses using communicating thermostat data to significantly increase the customer uptake of energy conservation measures (ECMs) by identifying homes with the most significant retrofit opportunities, estimating post-retrofit energy savings, and formulating home-specific outreach. We extended our previously developed gray-box building model to identify physical building parameters corresponding to the target retrofit opportunities, i.e., whole-home R value, air leakage characteristics, and heating system efficiency. The estimated R values and air leakage characteristics compare favorably with the ground truth. The validated algorithms can calculate home-specific energy savings estimate for each ECM, and the algorithm outputs can be used by utility EE programs to formulate home-specific retrofit offers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy efficiency enables distributed off-grid renewable energy systems—from solar home systems to renewable micro-grids—to deliver energy services that otherwise might be economically or technically infeasible in resource-constrained settings. When super-efficient appliances are used, the total cost of solar home systems and their associated appliances can be reduced by as much as 50% (Phadke et al. 2015). The authors of this paper will first explore the broader interplay of energy access and energy efficiency for off- and weak-grid settings by sharing learnings from the Efficiency for Access Coalition and the UK aid funded Low-Energy Inclusive Appliances (LEIA) program. To serve as a concrete example among off-grid appliance technologies, this paper will then explore the work of LEIA and other Coalition partners to accelerate cost and efficiency improvements in off-grid refrigeration. Refrigeration presents significant technical challenges to off-grid energy systems because of high-energy demand in addition to the lack of consistent and comparable performance data to help market stakeholders make effective and informed decisions about product selection. To help address this knowledge gap in the market, this paper presents the findings of a baseline product testing effort used to establish a foundational understanding of the field performance of commercially available off-grid refrigerators. The paper further explores the role of innovation cash prizes in catalyzing technology innovation and market expansion of off-grid refrigeration analyzing them through the lens of the Global Lighting and Energy Access Partnership (Global LEAP) Off-Grid Refrigerator Competition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally, around 1.1 billion people do not have access to electricity and 84% of the population who do not have modern energy access are living in rural and remote areas of developing countries. Since the loads are far from the grid and providing the connection by extending from the main grid requires a high investment associated with long and costly transmission and distribution lines, addressing the problem requires innovative solutions. Therefore, off-grid microgrid systems, using solar photovoltaic and storage systems, integrated with very high-efficiency lighting appliances, are a promising solution to supply energy for rural and remote location in areas which lack access to the electric grid. This paper presents an overview on the existing solar photovoltaic technologies for off-grid systems including the most recent plug and play solutions. A characterization of the most common strategies used for control, communication and metering of microgrids is presented, as well as the recent evolution of the associated component technologies. The security and protection systems used to protect the system against theft or robbery of the systems itself or energy theft in remote areas are also addressed. Additionally, a resumed characterization of the sociologic profile and motivation of people to damage off-grid systems is presented. An overview on the main off-grid appliance market evolution and efficiency trends, in terms of energy efficiency, is also addressed in this paper. Finally, a set of recommendations to promote cost-effective systems is made, considering the market evolution path and the large growth potential of off-grid systems. There is an urgent need to reduce the total system costs, namely the soft costs of new microgrid systems in order to further accelerate the market growth, as well as widely accepted open standards to regulate and develop the market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing buildings represent a significant energy saving potential in Europe, and retrofitting the building stock is essential to reach European targets. Retrofitting measures should reduce the energy consumption as well as improve the indoor climate while still being cost-effective. This can be challenging in European cold climates. This paper discusses energy performance requirements and challenges in the retrofitting process. It also presents an overview of the retrofitting status and relevant energy saving retrofitting measures with their potential for residential buildings. Measures to lower the building's energy demand and electrical energy consumption and measures to control and monitor the energy use are discussed. Some research directions for the future of building energy usage are suggested. The literature indicates that significant energy savings can be achieved from retrofitting the building envelope. Relatively few research papers have been devoted to the energy saving potential of building control systems for existing residential buildings. However, these savings seem low compared to those that can be achieved through energy conservation. The actual savings from retrofitting the envelope, HVAC-systems and control systems are case specific and should be assessed for reference buildings of each housing typology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Washing machines have in recent years incorporated programmes that are very energy- and water-efficient, but this entails a long programme duration, often beyond 4 h. These are also the programmes that the manufactures use to define, test and declare the overall water and energy efficiency of the machines. In response to these developments, there is evidence that consumers are reluctant to use excessively lengthy programmes, even if they are aware that the programmes are more energy-efficient. This paper analyses this divergence of programme offer and programme use, which jeopardises the energy efficiency policy objectives for these appliances in the European Union (EU). The paper explores several policy measures to address this divergence, discussed in the context of the revision of the Ecodesign and Energy Labelling regulations that apply to washing machines in the EU. Three different measures are studied: the provision of information about the programme duration on the energy label, the inclusion of time as an intrinsic parameter of the energy efficiency index calculations and the setting of a programme duration cap. The paper concludes that introducing programme duration as an additional parameter of the energy efficiency index would result in the highest energy savings. However, this scenario is associated with significant uncertainties since competition among the manufacturers for a better energy label classification will not solely focus on energy efficiency aspects, and the outcome of such competition is unclear. The other two measures investigated are less effective but would also deliver savings. A programme duration cap would bring energy savings if consumers are aware of their existence and select the now shorter yet energy-efficient programmes more often. The provision of programme duration information on the energy label would also be effective but requires that consumers are able to correctly understand it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this paper is to analyze the equilibrium of the Italian market of white certificates (WC) during the 2006–2021 period by relying upon granular data of prices, traded volumes, demand, supply, and information on regulatory interventions. It emerges that market forces, represented by an infinitely inelastic demand curve and a convex supply function, describe the trends of prices and traded volumes up to mid-2016, while they do not during the following biennium. We suppose that the remarkable and sharp fluctuations of the WC price observed in 2016–2018 are due to decreasing returns that energy companies face in energy efficiency investments and to exogenous shocks caused by poorly designed regulatory interventions. It turns out that the equilibrium is the results of interactions between market forces and public intervention, as well as their related failures, aiming to a self-sustainable mechanism oriented to technological innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Demand-side management (DSM) seeks to reduce overall energy consumption or change when energy is used to reduce peak demands and smooth the load curve. DSM is increasingly moving to the forefront of the energy policy agenda in many countries due to objectives for energy security, affordability and carbon emissions reduction. However, the policy side of DSM has been little explored in the literature, and the paper proposes how the method of systematic reviews can be applied to the energy policy field. Systematic reviews are commonly used in the medical sciences and are beginning to be applied to social science disciplines. The realist synthesis approach is utilised to determine not only impacts, but to analyse how and why policies are successful, and how contextual factors, such as market structure and regulatory environment, influence their success. A study quality assessment scale is proposed to appraise the quality of studies in determining what documents are included in the review. Systematic reviews are an effective method for collating the results of all the previous studies that have been done on a given programme, and it has an important and useful role for improving the evidence base for informing energy policy. The paper focuses on evaluating the method, discusses the case for realist synthesis to overcome issues of establishing how and why DSM policies work or fail and gives an example from ongoing research into how it can be applied to analyse DSM policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brovst is a small district in Denmark. This paper analyses the use of local renewable resources in the district heating systems of Brovst. The present use of fossil fuels in the Brovst district heating plant (DHP) represents an increasing environmental and climate-related load. Therefore, an investigation has been made to reduce the use of fossil fuels for district heating system and make use of the local renewable resources (biogas, solar, and heat pump) for district heating purposes. In this article, the techno-economic assessment is achieved through the development of a suite of models that are combined to give cost and performance data for this district heating system. Local fuels have been analyzed for different perspectives to find the way to optimize the whole integrated system in accordance with fuel availability and cost. This paper represents the energy system analysis mode, energyPRO, which has been used to analyze the integration of a large-scale energy system into the domestic district heating system. A model of the current work on the basis of information from the Brovst plant (using fossil fuel) is established and named as a reference option. Then, four other options are calculated using the same procedure according to the use of various local renewable fuels known as 'biogas option,' 'solar option,' 'heat pump option,' and 'imported heat option.' A comparison has been made between the reference option and other options. The greatest reduction in heat cost is obtained from the biogas option by replacing a new engine, where 66 % of the current fuel is substituted with biogas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The street lighting is one of major components in total energy consumption in cities. The paper is focused on a concept of street lamp control systems and function organization with remote monitoring, to reduce maintenance costs and energy consumption. A new approach to the definition of functional strategy organization for outdoor lighting systems is introduced in the paper. Proposed functional strategies are based on four efficiency classes of building automation and control systems (BACS) defined in the EN 15323 standard. They have been formulated, analysed and eventually implemented and verified in real experiment street lighting installation. This outdoor lighting system, designed by the authors, based on LonWorks (the ISO/IEC EN 14908) platform with a power line communication aimed to control high-pressure sodium lamps. The street lamps are integrated nodes of a building management system (BMS). The results of experimental tests for the proposed functional strategies, implemented with various control scenarios, show that they provide a great potential in reducing energy consumption by street lighting installations. In particular, the energy use can be reduced even by 45 % in comparison to conventional street lighting system, especially without the use of monitoring and control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The emphasis of this paper is to show the existence of some non-energy benefits that can be taken into account in an energy efficiency investment aimed to reduce energy consumption and increase production and product quality in an oil and gas processing center (OGPC) in México. The function of OGPC is to separate crude oil, gas, and saltwater coming from marine and terrestrial oil fields. Traditionally, application of process energy integration techniques has been aimed to reduce energy consumption associated with heating and cooling services. In this paper, the process energy integration (standard pinch analysis) of an OGPC shows the possibility of reducing natural gas and electricity consumption by 75 % and 98 %, respectively. However, the novel aspect of this work is the identifications and use of some waste heat streams available in processes to reduce energy consumption, and more importantly couple them with some non-energy-related benefits to produce massive economical savings. For example, by allowing an improvement in the quality of heavy crude oil for exportation (reduction in salt content), an increased sale price of 0.6 USD/barrel is achieved, rising profit to 156.88 MMUSD/year. Additional economic benefits came from the restauration of the production of 3,711 barrel of naphtha per day (33.86 MMUSD/year), by solving security issues related to the use of direct-fire heaters in the condensate stabilization plant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing non-residential building stock can generally be considered energy-inefficient. The ECUK 2017 report states that the final energy consumption for commercial buildings remained static. The 2010 recast Energy Performance Building Directive (EPBD) has set out a requirement for commercial and residential buildings to be nearly Zero Energy Buildings (nZEBs) by 2020. Despite this, within the UK, a definition does not exist at the national level for commercial nZEBs (new or existing). This paper utilises the EU zebra2020 data tool to set a standard based on the existing UK nZEB commercial building stock. The aim of this paper is to investigate and assess the potential of various energy-efficient measures (EEMs) and their contribution to reducing energy consumption, primary energy consumption (PEC), and CO2 emissions whilst taking into consideration the energy and cost savings of those measures. The analysis is carried out using Thermal Analysis Simulation software (Tas, Edsl). The model validation obtained a performance gap of less than 5%. The results show that it is possible to achieve the nZEB standard for older UK hotel buildings if several measures are implemented and the initial selection of EEMs is carefully investigated. Based on the results, reaching the nZEB target should first take into consideration improving the building fabric and/or building envelope elements to lower the energy demand. Once the energy demand of the building is lowered, the incorporation of a renewable/microgeneration system is essential to meeting the nZEB target. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy consumption by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is collectively significant, and whilst opportunities for substantial, cost-effective efficiency savings exist, take up is low. Whereas research tackling this challenge typically focuses on barriers and drivers to action, this paper offers an alternative perspective, investigating energy management as a practice. Drawing on practice theory and the concept of organisational sensemaking, narrative accounts provide in-depth insights into energy management practice within three SMEs. Auto-ethnographic reflections from 5 years of providing energy and environmental advice are supplemented by findings from carbon footprint assessments and interviews. Findings show that despite energy management being perceived as a peripheral business activity, it is intertwined with organisational identity and knowledge production in each of the three SMEs. Business advisors are instrumental in steering SME energy management practices and have a responsibility to reflect on how they influence processes of knowledge production and meaning-making in organisations. Implications for policy-makers, advisors and the research community are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sound evaluation needs sound numbers. But measuring energy savings is measuring something that is not used and can meet unexpected difficulties. The European Commission has made strong efforts to harmonize methods to measure energy efficiency and energy savings and to monitor the progress towards the goals of the Energy Efficiency Directive. However, in practice, multiple methods are still used, which may lead to confusion. In this paper, we use the Netherlands as a case study to analyze this phenomenon. In the Netherlands, three national indicators on energy efficiency exist, next to a European indicator next to the impact of individual policy instruments. The large differences and sometimes contradictory results of the different indicators lead to questions about what is the "best" method. This paper studies the reasons behind the differences between the methods used for industrial energy efficiency improvement in the Netherlands. It compares detailed bottom-up data from individual policy instruments with top-down national figures. We disentangle the impact of volume, efficiency, and structure effects. In this way, we visualize the differences between several methods and the impact of the choice of metrics used in those methods. This helps understanding why care should be taken when comparing industrial energy efficiency results from different countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates whether the operation of emission trading scheme (ETS) helps to improve energy efficiency in China. Stochastic frontier analysis is used to estimate energy efficiency at province level and sector levels, and the difference-in-differences technique is applied to assess the effectiveness of emission trading. The main findings are as follows: (1) energy efficiency may be underestimated if control variables are taken no account in efficiency estimation; (2) the diversity of energy efficiency is rather high across different provinces or sectors, and (3) ETS is not as effective for energy efficiency improvement as supposed, but its stimulation effect on provincial energy efficiency is prominently positive. It is suggested that it might be more appropriate to implement ETS program in industry or transport sector than in various sectors throughout the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current concern over energy utilization and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions can be surveyed by investigating potential energy savings and potential emissions reduction in order to emit less greenhouse gases (GHG), thus allowing countries to create economic growth while at the same time preventing global warming and mitigating climate change. The main objective of this paper is to analyze long-term potential energy savings, potential emissions reduction, and long-term technology gaps on energy utilization and CO2 emissions in G7 and BRICS during 2000–2014. The paper also sets up an index to measure convergence or divergence in the technology gaps on energy utilization and CO2 emissions. The results conclude that the UK, Italy, and France have the smallest overall technology gap, while the largest overall technology gap appears in South Africa, Russia, and the USA. To this end, the technology gap on energy utilization in BRICS is improving in recent years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]