A Litmus Test of Greenhouse Gas Policy Initiatives: Electric Utilities

本研究的目的是开发一个全面的 竞争性温室气体排放的成本和效益评估 天然气政策措施适用于电力行业， 已经成为任何一个主要参与者的行业 解决全球变暖问题。 现有的研究通常集中在 美国或全球经济总量， 消费模式将如何变化， 应对监管引起的价格变化。 相比之下， 项目实施了一个应用宏观经济模型的企业 行为来评估电力公司将如何应对 替代性政策举措。 该模型将用于 比较和对比各种政策的关键属性 选择，如碳含量税的燃料，税收的 任何排放的温室气体的碳当量含量，a 减少排放，减少排放， 允许交易。 为此设计的计量经济模型和微观数据集 项目将为每个策略生成以下信息 模仿：二氧化碳、一氧化二氮的预期减少量 氧化物、总碳当量排放、边际成本 减少这些排放，对价格产生的影响 电力，以及对二氧化硫和 和火山灰排放。 这些信息可用于排名 在相对成本方面相互竞争的政策工具， 有效性

The purpose of this research is to develop a comprehensive assessment of the cost and effectiveness of competing greenhouse gas policy initiatives applied to the electric power industry, an industry already targeted as a primary participant in any solution to global warming. Existing studies typically focus on the aggregate U.S or global economies and have a demand-side orientation, evaluating how consumption patterns will change in response to regulation-induced price changes. In contrast, this project implements an applied macroeconomic model of firm behavior to assess how electric utilities would respond to alternative policy initiatives. The model will be used to compare and contrast the critical properties of various policy options such as a carbon-content tax on fuels, a tax on the carbon-equivalent content of any emitted greenhouse gas, a command reduction in emissions, and a command reduction with allowed trading. The econometric model and micro data set designed for this project will generate the following information for each policy imitative: the expected reductions in carbon dioxide, nitrous oxides, overall carbon-equivalent emissions, the marginal costs of reducing these emissions, the resulting impact on prices of electricity, and the coincident effects on both sulfur dioxide and ash emissions. This information can be used to rank competing policy tools in terms of relative costs and effectiveness.