Microeconomic Analysis for the Formation of Renewable Energy Support Policy: the Case of Wind Power Sector in Lithuania

Abstract

Economic research of renewable energy sources (RES) intensified in recent years through implementation of the European Union Directives and the following Regulations. Incentives for wider use of RES are declared both in the European Union and in Lithuanian laws. However, it may be stated that there is lack of research, which would give answers to questions on economic assumptions that would link energy policy to economic results and would justify benefits of the use of RES technologies on a national scale. Thus, this paper aims at presenting methodological principles of wind power technologies assessment based on economic indicators. The impact of wind power technologies implementation on the economy was estimated based on microeconomic analysis method. Levelised cost of energy approach was used to compute wind power prime cost. Economic indicators were computed. The research results disclosed that investment subsidy and feed-in tariffs are attractive support measures for the investor. They could be used to promote wind power sector development in Lithuania in the future. Energy policy decision making should be based on the economic assessment principles. Wind power support schemes and support levels should be reconsidered taking into account the net benefits of wind power technologies. Wind power technologies are beneficial to economy due to their impact on profit, income-based taxes, electricity import substitution and CO2 savings.

Public Service Obligation Levy in the Context of Energy Sustainability and Security: The Cases of Ireland, Greece, Denmark and Lithuania

“…Bioenergy (21%) came next [189]. Klevas, Bobinaite, Maciukaitis and Tarvydas [190] examined RES (wind energy) support measures and policies in Lithuania and noted that support from structural funds should be used in the short term. A feed-in tariff was also mentioned as an effective support tool allowing the maintenance of the competitiveness of the wind energy in the market.…”

Policies and energy consumption-driven trends facilitating development of the value chain for wind energy component manufacturing in Lithuania

“…Until [6] and [7] published their research results on the competitiveness of companies manufacturing WEC and on related issues of labour productivity, no research has been carried out on WEC manufacturing in Lithuania. Lithuanian researchers [8][9][10][11][12][13][14] focused more on the development of the country's wind energy sector, creating a framework for the development of onshore and offshore wind energy techniques, economy, environment, and policy making. In the context of all these studies, the present research is distinguished by the scope of the scientific problem, the variety of methods used to solve it, and by the originality of the data sources for the explanation of the processes taking place and the identification of patterns.…”

A Scoping Review of Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment

“…The existing infrastructure is used, and a new one, which can cope with the load when using renewable energy [33,34], is built to support and function such communities. The deployment of microgrids and virtual power plants is among the many innovations needed to integrate renewable energy sources [35,36]. In addition, the transition to sustainable business models [37,38] requires updating the requirements for flexibility, security [39,40], management of energy systems [41,42].…”