Since 2006, China has experienced an unprecedented expansion of its wind and solar power generation capacity and associated manufacturing industries. This rapid growth was supported by large subsidies that resulted in a significant and increasing government subsidy debt to renewable investors as well as a high curtailment rate for renewable electricity. This article reviews China’s renewable electricity development and policies between 2006 and 2020.

Based on a county-level monthly panel data from four provinces and a province-level monthly panel data from 21 provinces from 2009 to 2015, we use the regression discontinuity method to examine the impacts of the tired pricing reform implemented in July 2012 on residential electricity use in China. The county-level (province-level) estimation shows that the tiered pricing reform has reduced the monthly electricity use per household by 6.5 ​kWh (8.9 ​kWh), accounting for 6.1% (7.1%) of the monthly electricity use per household.

Developing the abundant shale gas in China is a potential means to address the country’s challenges in air pollution and carbon emissions. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the production potential of the most promising shale gas play—the Wufeng-Longmaxi Formation (WL) in China. We use a Difference-Index analogy method and well-level U.S. shale gas drilling data to estimate the production potential and use a scenario simulation method to propose optimal drilling plans.

The emissions reductions from the adoption of a new transportation technology depend on the emissions from the new technology relative to those from the displaced technology. We evaluate the emissions reductions from electric vehicles (EVs) by identifying which vehicles would have been purchased had EVs not been available. We do so by estimating a random coefficients discrete choice model of new vehicle demand and simulating counterfactual sales with EVs no longer subsidized or removed from the new vehicle market.

The increasing scarcity of environmental resources and competition among forest, water, food and energy coupled with the ever-growing population and climate change pose a serious threat to natural ecosystems. In an effort to provide an integrated approach towards forest conservation as well as energy, water and food security within the broader context of climate change and variability, this study sought to undertake a literature and data review to provide a critical analysis and synthesis of the baseline and trends of the forest- water-food- energy security nexus in East Africa.

We study the implementation of a time-varying pricing (TVP) program by a major electricity utility in Costa Rica. Because of particular features of the data, we use recently developed understanding of the two-way fixed effects differences-in-differences estimator along with event-study specifications to interpret our results. Similar to previous research, we find that the program reduces consumption during peak-hours. However, in contrast with previous research, we find that the program increases total consumption.

Policies aimed at enhancing adoption of energy efficient, less polluting fuels, stoves and cooking practices need to be aligned to the realities of household multiple uses of fuels and stoves. In this paper we assess energy ladder model by using large nationwide survey data of 3665 Kenyan households collected in 2009. We show that the energy ladder is still sufficient to explain multiple fuel use and stove, and that the use of ‘fuel or stove staking’ metaphor was unnecessarily.

Can behavioural interventions achieve energy savings in non-residential settings where users do not face the financial consequences of their behaviour? Our paper addresses this question by using high-frequency data, leveraging social comparison and responsibility assignment in a large provincial government office building with 24 floors, a total of 1008 occupants. Floors were divided into two treatments arms and a control group.