IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/enepol/v62y2013icp1226-1237.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Business model innovation for sustainable energy: German utilities and renewable energy

Author

Listed:
  • Richter, Mario

Abstract

The electric power sector stands at the beginning of a fundamental transformation process towards a more sustainable production based on renewable energies. Consequently, electric utilities as incumbent actors face a massive challenge to find new ways of creating, delivering, and capturing value from renewable energy technologies. This study investigates utilities' business models for renewable energies by analyzing two generic business models based on a series of in-depth interviews with German utility managers. It is found that utilities have developed viable business models for large-scale utility-side renewable energy generation. At the same time, utilities lack adequate business models to commercialize small-scale customer-side renewable energy technologies. By combining the business model concept with innovation and organization theory practical recommendations for utility mangers and policy makers are derived.

Suggested Citation

  • Richter, Mario, 2013. "Business model innovation for sustainable energy: German utilities and renewable energy," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 1226-1237.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:62:y:2013:i:c:p:1226-1237
    DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2013.05.038
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030142151300373X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.enpol.2013.05.038?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    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. Ari, Izzet & Aydinalp Koksal, Merih, 2011. "Carbon dioxide emission from the Turkish electricity sector and its mitigation options," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 6120-6135, October.
    2. He, Xian & Delarue, Erik & D'haeseleer, William & Glachant, Jean-Michel, 2011. "A novel business model for aggregating the values of electricity storage," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 1575-1585, March.
    3. Alva Taylor & Constance E. Helfat, 2009. "Organizational Linkages for Surviving Technological Change: Complementary Assets, Middle Management, and Ambidexterity," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 20(4), pages 718-739, August.
    4. Christoph Zott & Raphael Amit, 2008. "The fit between product market strategy and business model: implications for firm performance," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(1), pages 1-26, January.
    5. Henry Chesbrough & Richard S. Rosenbloom, 2002. "The role of the business model in capturing value from innovation: evidence from Xerox Corporation's technology spin-off companies," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 11(3), pages 529-555, June.
    6. Schleicher-Tappeser, Ruggero, 2012. "How renewables will change electricity markets in the next five years," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 64-75.
    7. Loock, Moritz, 2012. "Going beyond best technology and lowest price: on renewable energy investors’ preference for service-driven business models," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 21-27.
    8. Kathleen M. Eisenhardt & Jeffrey A. Martin, 2000. "Dynamic capabilities: what are they?," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(10‐11), pages 1105-1121, October.
    9. Omer, Abdeen Mustafa, 2008. "Green energies and the environment," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 12(7), pages 1789-1821, September.
    10. Kley, Fabian & Lerch, Christian & Dallinger, David, 2011. "New business models for electric cars--A holistic approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 3392-3403, June.
    11. Sebastian Raisch & Julian Birkinshaw & Gilbert Probst & Michael L. Tushman, 2009. "Organizational Ambidexterity: Balancing Exploitation and Exploration for Sustained Performance," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 20(4), pages 685-695, August.
    12. O'Reilly, Charles & Harreld, J. Bruce & Tushman, Michael L., 2009. "Organizational Ambidexterity: IBM and Emerging Business Opportunities," Research Papers 2025, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    13. Richter, Mario, 2012. "Utilities’ business models for renewable energy: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 16(5), pages 2483-2493.
    14. Onovwiona, H.I. & Ugursal, V.I., 2006. "Residential cogeneration systems: review of the current technology," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 10(5), pages 389-431, October.
    15. Alanne, Kari & Saari, Arto, 2006. "Distributed energy generation and sustainable development," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 10(6), pages 539-558, December.
    16. Frei, Christoph W., 2008. "What if...? Utility vision 2020," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(10), pages 3640-3645, October.
    17. Okkonen, Lasse & Suhonen, Niko, 2010. "Business models of heat entrepreneurship in Finland," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(7), pages 3443-3452, July.
    18. David J. Teece & Gary Pisano & Amy Shuen, 1997. "Dynamic capabilities and strategic management," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(7), pages 509-533, August.
    19. Richter, Mario, 2013. "German utilities and distributed PV: How to overcome barriers to business model innovation," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 456-466.
    20. Shrimali, Gireesh & Slaski, Xander & Thurber, Mark C. & Zerriffi, Hisham, 2011. "Improved stoves in India: A study of sustainable business models," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(12), pages 7543-7556.
    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. Jesús Rodríguez-Molina & Margarita Martínez-Núñez & José-Fernán Martínez & Waldo Pérez-Aguiar, 2014. "Business Models in the Smart Grid: Challenges, Opportunities and Proposals for Prosumer Profitability," Energies, MDPI, vol. 7(9), pages 1-30, September.
    2. Karakaya, Emrah & Nuur, Cali & Hidalgo, Antonio, 2016. "Business model challenge: Lessons from a local solar company," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 1026-1035.
    3. Engelken, Maximilian & Römer, Benedikt & Drescher, Marcus & Welpe, Isabell M. & Picot, Arnold, 2016. "Comparing drivers, barriers, and opportunities of business models for renewable energies: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 795-809.
    4. Úbeda-García, Mercedes & Claver-Cortés, Enrique & Marco-Lajara, Bartolomé & Zaragoza-Sáez, Patrocinio, 2020. "Toward a dynamic construction of organizational ambidexterity: Exploring the synergies between structural differentiation, organizational context, and interorganizational relations," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 363-372.
    5. Helms, Thorsten, 2016. "Asset transformation and the challenges to servitize a utility business model," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 98-112.
    6. Richter, Mario, 2012. "Utilities’ business models for renewable energy: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 16(5), pages 2483-2493.
    7. Michael Hamwi & Iban Lizarralde, 2019. "Demand-side management and renewable energy business models for energy transition A systematic review," Post-Print hal-02448505, HAL.
    8. Hall, Stephen & Roelich, Katy, 2016. "Business model innovation in electricity supply markets: The role of complex value in the United Kingdom," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 286-298.
    9. Maria Rosa De Giacomo & Raimund Bleischwitz, 2020. "Business models for environmental sustainability: Contemporary shortcomings and some perspectives," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(8), pages 3352-3369, December.
    10. David B. Audretsch & Maribel Guerrero, 2023. "Is ambidexterity the missing link between entrepreneurship, management, and innovation?," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 48(6), pages 1891-1918, December.
    11. O'Reilly, Charles A., III & Tushman, Michael L., 2013. "Organizational Ambidexterity: Past, Present and Future," Research Papers 2130, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    12. Ansari, Shahzad (Shaz) & Krop, Pieter, 2012. "Incumbent performance in the face of a radical innovation: Towards a framework for incumbent challenger dynamics," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(8), pages 1357-1374.
    13. Ahlgren Ode, Kajsa & Lagerstedt Wadin, Jessica, 2019. "Business model translation—The case of spreading a business model for solar energy," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 23-31.
    14. Latifi, Mohammad-Ali & Nikou, Shahrokh & Bouwman, Harry, 2021. "Business model innovation and firm performance: Exploring causal mechanisms in SMEs," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 107(C).
    15. Belussi, Fiorenza & Orsi, Luigi & Savarese, Maria, 2019. "Mapping Business Model Research: A Document Bibliometric Analysis," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 35(3).
    16. Elias Carayannis & Stavros Sindakis & Christian Walter, 2015. "Business Model Innovation as Lever of Organizational Sustainability," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 85-104, February.
    17. Herbes, Carsten & Brummer, Vasco & Rognli, Judith & Blazejewski, Susanne & Gericke, Naomi, 2017. "Responding to policy change: New business models for renewable energy cooperatives – Barriers perceived by cooperatives’ members," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 82-95.
    18. Yuan, Chun & Xue, Doudou & He, Xin, 2021. "A balancing strategy for ambidextrous learning, dynamic capabilities, and business model design, the opposite moderating effects of environmental dynamism," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    19. Kathleen M. Eisenhardt & Nathan R. Furr & Christopher B. Bingham, 2010. "CROSSROADS---Microfoundations of Performance: Balancing Efficiency and Flexibility in Dynamic Environments," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(6), pages 1263-1273, December.
    20. Eriksson, Taina, 2014. "Processes, antecedents and outcomes of dynamic capabilities," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 65-82.

    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:enepol:v:62:y:2013:i:c:p:1226-1237. 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/enpol .

    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.