IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/eneeco/v30y2008i4p1933-1950.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Evaluating the power investment options with uncertainty in climate policy

Author

Listed:
  • Yang, Ming
  • Blyth, William
  • Bradley, Richard
  • Bunn, Derek
  • Clarke, Charlie
  • Wilson, Tom

Abstract

This paper uses a real options approach (ROA) for analysing the effects of government climate policy uncertainty on private investors' decision-making in the power sector. It presents an analysis undertaken by the International Energy Agency (IEA) that implements ROA within a dynamic programming approach for technology investment choice. Case studies for gas, coal and nuclear power investment are undertaken with the model. Illustrative results from the model indicate four broad conclusions: i) climate change policy risks can become large if there is only a short time between a future climate policy event such as post-2012 and the time when the investment decision is being made; ii) the way in which CO2 and fuel price variations feed through to electricity price variations is an important determinant of the overall investment risk that companies will face; iii) investment risks vary according to the technology being considered, with nuclear power appearing to be particularly exposed to fuel and CO2 price risks under various assumptions; and iv) the government will be able to reduce investors' risks by implementing long-term (say 10 years) rather than short-term (say 5 years) climate change policy frameworks. Contributions of this study include: (1) having created a step function with stochastic volume of jump at a particular time to simulate carbon price shock under a particular climate policy event; (2) quantifying the implicit risk premium of carbon price uncertainty to investors in new capacity; (3) evaluating carbon price risk alongside energy price risk in investment decision-making; and (4) demonstrating ROA to be a useful tool to quantify the impacts of climate change policy uncertainty on power investment.

Suggested Citation

  • Yang, Ming & Blyth, William & Bradley, Richard & Bunn, Derek & Clarke, Charlie & Wilson, Tom, 2008. "Evaluating the power investment options with uncertainty in climate policy," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 1933-1950, July.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:eneeco:v:30:y:2008:i:4:p:1933-1950
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140-9883(07)00080-1
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lin, Tyrone T. & Ko, Chuan-Chuan & Yeh, Hsin-Ni, 2007. "Applying real options in investment decisions relating to environmental pollution," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 2426-2432, April.
    2. Gerard H. Kuper & Daan P. van Soest, 2006. "Does Oil Price Uncertainty Affect Energy Use?," The Energy Journal, , vol. 27(1), pages 55-78, January.
    3. Geoffrey Rothwell, 2006. "A Real Options Approach to Evaluating New Nuclear Power Plants," The Energy Journal, , vol. 27(1), pages 37-54, January.
    4. Gerard H. Kuper & Daan P. van Soest, 2006. "Does Oil Price Uncertainty Affect Energy Use?," The Energy Journal, , vol. 27(1), pages 55-78, January.
    5. Myers, Stewart C., 1977. "Determinants of corporate borrowing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 147-175, November.
    6. Avinash K. Dixit & Robert S. Pindyck, 1994. "Investment under Uncertainty," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 5474.
    7. Marreco, Juliana de Moraes & Carpio, Lucio Guido Tapia, 2006. "Flexibility valuation in the Brazilian power system: A real options approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(18), pages 3749-3756, December.
    8. Siddiqui, Afzal S. & Marnay, Chris & Wiser, Ryan H., 2007. "Real options valuation of US federal renewable energy research, development, demonstration, and deployment," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 265-279, January.
    9. Laurikka, Harri, 2006. "Option value of gasification technology within an emissions trading scheme," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(18), pages 3916-3928, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yang, Ming & Nguyen, François & De T'Serclaes, Philippine & Buchner, Barbara, 2010. "Wind farm investment risks under uncertain CDM benefit in China," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 1436-1447, March.
    2. Dominik Kryzia & Michał Kopacz & Katarzyna Kryzia, 2020. "The Valuation of the Operational Flexibility of the Energy Investment Project Based on a Gas-Fired Power Plant," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-16, March.
    3. Apergis, Nicholas & Lau, Marco Chi Keung, 2015. "Structural breaks and electricity prices: Further evidence on the role of climate policy uncertainties in the Australian electricity market," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(PA), pages 176-182.
    4. Felipe Isaza Cuervo & Sergio Botero Boterob, 2014. "Aplicación de las opciones reales en la toma de decisiones en los mercados de electricidad," Estudios Gerenciales, Universidad Icesi, November.
    5. Lee, Shun-Chung & Shih, Li-Hsing, 2010. "Renewable energy policy evaluation using real option model -- The case of Taiwan," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(Supplemen), pages 67-78, September.
    6. Fernandes, Bartolomeu & Cunha, Jorge & Ferreira, Paula, 2011. "The use of real options approach in energy sector investments," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 15(9), pages 4491-4497.
    7. Casper Agaton, 2017. "Coal, Renewable, or Nuclear? A Real Options Approach to Energy Investments in the Philippines," International Journal of Sustainable Energy and Environmental Research, Conscientia Beam, vol. 6(2), pages 50-62.
    8. Audrey Laude & Christian Jonen, 2011. "Biomass and CCS: The influence of the learning effect," Working Papers halshs-00829779, HAL.
    9. Lee, Shun-Chung, 2011. "Using real option analysis for highly uncertain technology investments: The case of wind energy technology," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 15(9), pages 4443-4450.
    10. Madlener, Reinhard & Stoverink, Simon, 2012. "Power plant investments in the Turkish electricity sector: A real options approach taking into account market liberalization," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 124-134.
    11. Chuan-Chuan Ko & Chien-Yu Liu & Zan-Yu Chen & Jing Zhou, 2019. "Sustainable Development Economic Strategy Model for Reducing Carbon Emission by Using Real Options Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(19), pages 1-14, October.
    12. Schachter, J.A. & Mancarella, P., 2016. "A critical review of Real Options thinking for valuing investment flexibility in Smart Grids and low carbon energy systems," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 261-271.
    13. Hampe, Jona & Madlener, Reinhard, 2012. "Economics of High-Temperature Nuclear Reactors for Industrial Cogeneration," FCN Working Papers 10/2012, E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN).
    14. Lin, Boqiang & Wesseh, Presley K., 2013. "Valuing Chinese feed-in tariffs program for solar power generation: A real options analysis," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 474-482.
    15. Cuervo, Felipe Isaza & Botero, Sergio Botero, 2016. "Wind power reliability valuation in a Hydro-Dominated power market: The Colombian case," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 1359-1372.
    16. Cheng, Ching-Tsung & Lo, Shang-Lien & Lin, Tyrone T., 2011. "Applying real options analysis to assess cleaner energy development strategies," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 5929-5938, October.
    17. Siddiqui, Afzal & Fleten, Stein-Erik, 2010. "How to proceed with competing alternative energy technologies: A real options analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 817-830, July.
    18. Martínez-Ceseña, E.A. & Mutale, J., 2011. "Application of an advanced real options approach for renewable energy generation projects planning," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 2087-2094, May.
    19. Das Gupta, Supratim, 2018. "Using real options to study the impact of capacity additions and investment expenditures in renewable energies in India," MPRA Paper 90441, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Hieronymi, Philipp & Schüller, David, 2015. "The Clean-Development Mechanism, stochastic permit prices and energy investments," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 25-36.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:eneeco:v:30:y:2008:i:4:p:1933-1950. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eneco .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.