IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/rensus/v16y2012i6p4148-4156.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Experimental comparison of impact of auction format on carbon allowance market

Author

Listed:
  • Cong, Rong-Gang
  • Wei, Yi-Ming

Abstract

Carbon allowances auctions are a good way to achieve the carbon allowance allocations under international agreements to address global climate change. Based on an economic experiment, this paper compares three possible carbon allowance auction formats (uniform price auction, discriminatory price auction and English clock auction) with heterogeneous bidders (coal power plants and gas power plants) from four perspectives (carbon price, auction efficiency, demand withholding and fluctuations in power supplies). Possibilities of collusion among bidders and impacts of allowance banking and penalty price on bidders’ behaviors under different auction formats are also examined. The results show that (1) when there are relatively more bidders and there are no obvious communications between them, despite there being some tacit collusion, efficiency of English clock auction is greater than the other two formats; (2) when there are relatively fewer bidders and there are obvious communications between them, explicit collusions are observed under English clock auction. In this case, discriminatory price auction helps prevent collusion to some extents; (3) in the banking scenario, more speculations are observed, while penalty price exacerbates price volatility.

Suggested Citation

  • Cong, Rong-Gang & Wei, Yi-Ming, 2012. "Experimental comparison of impact of auction format on carbon allowance market," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 16(6), pages 4148-4156.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:rensus:v:16:y:2012:i:6:p:4148-4156
    DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2012.03.049
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032112002328
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.rser.2012.03.049?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. Paul Klemperer, 2002. "What Really Matters in Auction Design," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 169-189, Winter.
    2. Kling, Catherine & Rubin, Jonathan, 1997. "Bankable permits for the control of environmental pollution," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 101-115, April.
    3. David Porter & Roumen Vragov, 2006. "An experimental examination of demand reduction in multi-unit versions of the Uniform-price, Vickrey, and English auctions," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(6), pages 445-458.
    4. Urs Fischbacher, 2007. "z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(2), pages 171-178, June.
    5. Cason, Timothy N. & Gangadharan, Lata, 2006. "Emissions variability in tradable permit markets with imperfect enforcement and banking," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(2), pages 199-216, October.
    6. Svendsen, Gert Tinggaard & Vesterdal, Morten, 2003. "How to design greenhouse gas trading in the EU?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(14), pages 1531-1539, November.
    7. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    8. Ian W.H. Parry & Roberton C. Williams III & Lawrence H. Goulder, 2002. "When Can Carbon Abatement Policies Increase Welfare? The Fundamental Role of Distorted Factor Markets," Chapters, in: Lawrence H. Goulder (ed.), Environmental Policy Making in Economies with Prior Tax Distortions, chapter 25, pages 471-503, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    9. Cong, Rong-Gang & Wei, Yi-Ming, 2010. "Auction design for the allocation of carbon emission allowances: uniform or discriminatory price?," MPRA Paper 112210, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Dallas Burtraw & Jacob Goeree & Charles A. Holt & Erica Myers & Karen Palmer & William Shobe, 2009. "Collusion in auctions for emission permits: An experimental analysis," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(4), pages 672-691.
    11. Alsemgeest, Paul & Noussair, Charles & Olson, Mark, 1998. "Experimental Comparisons of Auctions under Single- and Multi-Unit Demand," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(1), pages 87-97, January.
    12. Jaime F. Zender & James J.D. Wang, 2002. "Auctioning divisible goods," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 19(4), pages 673-705.
    13. Ohta, Tokio, 2000. "Energy systems and adaptive complexity," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 67(1-2), pages 3-16, September.
    14. Elena Katok & Alvin E. Roth, 2004. "Auctions of Homogeneous Goods with Increasing Returns: Experimental Comparison of Alternative "Dutch" Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(8), pages 1044-1063, August.
    15. Aleksandar Saša Pekev{c} & Ilia Tsetlin, 2008. "Revenue Ranking of Discriminatory and Uniform Auctions with an Unknown Number of Bidders," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 54(9), pages 1610-1623, September.
    16. Godby, Robert W. & Mestelman, Stuart & Muller, R. Andrew & Welland, J. Douglas, 1997. "Emissions Trading with Shares and Coupons when Control over Discharges Is Uncertain," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 359-381, March.
    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. Anthony M. Kwasnica & Katerina Sherstyuk, 2013. "Multiunit Auctions," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 461-490, July.
    2. Aniol Llorente-Saguer & Ro’i Zultan, 2014. "Auction Mechanisms And Bidder Collusion: Bribes, Signals And Selection," Working Papers 1406, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Department of Economics.
    3. Saral, Krista Jabs, 2012. "Speculation and demand reduction in English clock auctions with resale," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 416-431.
    4. Llorente-Saguer, Aniol & Zultan, Ro’i, 2017. "Collusion and information revelation in auctions," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 84-102.
    5. Cong, Rong-Gang & Wei, Yi-Ming, 2010. "Auction design for the allocation of carbon emission allowances: uniform or discriminatory price?," MPRA Paper 112210, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Yiakoumi, Despina & Rouaix, Agathe & Phimister, Euan, 2022. "Evaluating capacity auction design for electricity: An experimental analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    7. Martin Sefton & Ping Zhang, 2014. "Divisible-good uniform price auctions: The role of allocation rules and communication among bidders," Research in Experimental Economics, in: Experiments in Financial Economics, volume 16, pages 53-86, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    8. Stranlund, John K. & Murphy, James J. & Spraggon, John M., 2011. "An experimental analysis of compliance in dynamic emissions markets," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 62(3), pages 414-429.
    9. Tang, Ling & Wu, Jiaqian & Yu, Lean & Bao, Qin, 2017. "Carbon allowance auction design of China's emissions trading scheme: A multi-agent-based approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 30-40.
    10. Haoran He & Yefeng Chen, 2021. "Auction mechanisms for allocating subsidies for carbon emissions reduction: an experimental investigation," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 57(2), pages 387-430, August.
    11. Dirk Engelmann & Veronika Grimm, 2009. "Bidding Behaviour in Multi-Unit Auctions - An Experimental Investigation," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(537), pages 855-882, April.
    12. Emilie Alberola & Julien Chevallier, 2009. "European Carbon Prices and Banking Restrictions: Evidence from Phase I (2005-2007)," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 3), pages 51-80.
    13. Restiani, Phillia & Betz, Regina, 2010. "The Effects of Penalty Design on Market Performance: Experimental Evidence from an Emissions Trading Scheme with Auctioned Permits," Research Reports 107586, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    14. Stranlund, John K. & Murphy, James J. & Spraggon, John M., 2014. "Price controls and banking in emissions trading: An experimental evaluation," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 71-86.
    15. Katerina Sherstyuk & Krit Phankitnirundorn & Michael J. Roberts, 2021. "Randomized double auctions: gains from trade, trader roles, and price discovery," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(4), pages 1325-1364, December.
    16. Abel M. Winn & Michael L. Parente & David Porter, 2016. "Seller Beware: Supply and Demand Reduction and Price Manipulation in Multiple‐Unit Uniform Price Auctions," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 82(3), pages 760-780, January.
    17. Cason, Timothy N. & Gangadharan, Lata, 2006. "Emissions variability in tradable permit markets with imperfect enforcement and banking," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(2), pages 199-216, October.
    18. Lata Gangadharan & Rachel Croson & Alex Farrell, 2013. "Investment decisions and emissions reductions: results from experiments in emissions trading," Chapters, in: John A. List & Michael K. Price (ed.), Handbook on Experimental Economics and the Environment, chapter 8, pages 233-264, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    19. Koji Kotani & Kenta Tanaka & Shunsuke Managi, 2019. "Which performs better under trader settings, double auction or uniform price auction?," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 22(1), pages 247-267, March.
    20. Larson, Nathan & Elmaghraby, Wedad, 2008. "Procurement auctions with avoidable fixed costs: an experimental approach," MPRA Paper 32163, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2011.

    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:rensus:v:16:y:2012:i:6:p:4148-4156. 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/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/600126/description#description .

    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.