Publications of the Research Unit Environmental and Climate Economics

  1. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 21-056 // 2021

    Supporting Residential Energy Conservation Under Constrained Public Budget: Cost-Effectiveness and Redistribution Analysis of Public Financial Schemes in France

    In the context of tight public budgets and increasingly ambitious climate objectives, the performance of the support policies for residential energy conservation works needs to be assessed. We compare the…

  2. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 21-054 // 2021

    Cost Dynamics of Clean Energy Technologies

    The pace of the global decarbonization process is widely believed to hinge on the rate of cost improvements for clean energy technologies, in particular renewable power and energy storage. This paper adopts the…

  3. ZEW policy brief No. 21-05 // 2021

    A Smart Design of New EU Emissions Trading Could Save 61 Per Cent of Mitigation Costs

    Carbon pricing is a key instrument for achieving Europe’s ambitious climate targets. It is therefore not surprising that reform of the EU carbon market is at the heart of the measures proposed by the European…

  4. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 21-053 // 2021

    Energy Conversion and Storage: The Value of Reversible Power-to-Gas Systems

    In the transition to decarbonized energy systems, Power-to-Gas (PtG) processes have the potential to connect the existing markets for electricity and hydrogen. Specifically, reversible PtG systems can convert…

  5. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 21-052 // 2021

    Corporate Carbon Reduction Pledges: An Effective Tool to Mitigate Climate Change?

    In the intensifying public debate about limiting the harmful effects of climate change, many global corporations have recently articulated so-called “net-zero” goals for reducing and ultimately eliminating their…

  6. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 21-048 // 2021

    The Impact of Carbon Prices on Renewable Energy Support

    This paper examines how optimal renewable energy (RE) support (RES) policies need to be adjusted to account for carbon prices. We show theoretically and empirically that changing carbon prices requires adjusting…

  7. Refereed Journal // 2021

    Gesellschaftliche Asymmetrien, Prosozialität und ein drittes Prinzip - Perspektiven auf moderne Gesellschaften im Anschluss an Marcel Mauss' Essay Die Gabe

    Marcel Mauss wrote in 1924 that he had found in the motifs of the "archaic" gift exchange of pre-modern societies "one of the rocks on which our societies rest" (Mauss, 1990, p.19). Gift practices persist in…