Publication: Sustainability of Solar Electricity: The Role of Endogenous Resource Substitution and Cross-Sectoral Responses
Loading...
Files in English
289 downloads
Published
2017-08
ISSN
0928-7655
Date
2018-02-08
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
This study seeks to understand how materials scarcity and competition from alternative uses affects the potential for widespread deployment of solar electricity in the long run, in light of related technology and policy uncertainties. Simulation results of a computable partial equilibrium model show that materials scarcities constrain the expansion of solar generation. Solar photovoltaics expand with higher energy demand, squeezing consumption in industries that compete for scarce minerals. Stringent climate policies hamper growth in intermittent solar photovoltaics backed by fossil fuel powered plants, which is not compensated by small increases in non-intermittent concentrated solar power capacity. These findings underscore the significance of developing cost-effective alternatives to critical materials and low-cost electricity storage for economically sustainable climate change mitigation.
Link to Data Set
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Citations
- Cited 10 times in Scopus (view citations)
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Sustainability of Solar Electricity : The Role of Endogenous Resource Substitution and Market Mediated Responses(World Bank Group, Washington, DC, 2015-01)This study seeks to understand how materials scarcity and competition from alternative uses affects the potential for widespread deployment of solar electricity in the long run, in light of related technology and policy uncertainties. Simulation results of a computable partial equilibrium model predict a considerable expansion of solar electricity generation worldwide in the near decades, as generation technologies improve and production costs fall. Increasing materials scarcity becomes a significant constraint for further expansion of solar generation, which grows considerably slower in the second half of the coming century. Solar generation capacity increases with higher energy demand, squeezing consumption in industries that compete for scarce minerals. Stringent climate policies hamper growth in intermittent solar photovoltaics backed by fossil fuel powered plants, but lead to a small increase in non-intermittent concentrated solar power technology. By the end of the coming century, solar electricity remains a marginal source of global electricity supply even in the world of higher energy demand, strict carbon regulations, and generation efficiency improvements.Publication A Review of Solar Energy : Markets, Economics and Policies(2011-10-01)Solar energy has experienced phenomenal growth in recent years due to both technological improvements resulting in cost reductions and government policies supportive of renewable energy development and utilization. This study analyzes the technical, economic and policy aspects of solar energy development and deployment. While the cost of solar energy has declined rapidly in the recent past, it still remains much higher than the cost of conventional energy technologies. Like other renewable energy technologies, solar energy benefits from fiscal and regulatory incentives and mandates, including tax credits and exemptions, feed-in-tariff, preferential interest rates, renewable portfolio standards and voluntary green power programs in many countries. Potential expansion of carbon credit markets also would provide additional incentives to solar energy deployment; however, the scale of incentives provided by the existing carbon market instruments, such as the Clean Development Mechanism of the Kyoto Protocol, is limited. Despite the huge technical potential, development and large-scale, market-driven deployment of solar energy technologies world-wide still has to overcome a number of technical and financial barriers. Unless these barriers are overcome, maintaining and increasing electricity supplies from solar energy will require continuation of potentially costly policy supports.Publication Utility-Scale Solar Photovoltaic Power Plants(Washington, DC, 2015-06)With an installed capacity greater than 137 gigawatts (GWs) worldwide and annual additions of about 40 GWs in recent years, solar photovoltaic (PV) technology has become an increasingly important energy supply option. A substantial decline in the cost of solar PV power plants (80 percent reduction since 2008) has improved solar PV’s competitiveness, reducing the needs for subsidies and enabling solar to compete with other power generation options in some markets. The World Bank Group (including the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the International Development Association, International Finance Corporation (IFC), and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency) helps client countries secure the affordable, reliable, and sustainable energy supply needed to end extreme poverty and promote shared prosperity. The approach mirrors the objectives of the sustainable energy for all initiative - achieving universal access, accelerating improvements in energy efficiency, and doubling the global share of renewable energy by 2030. The World Bank Group recognizes that each country determines its own path for achieving its energy aspirations, and that each country’s transition to a sustainable energy sector involves a unique mix of resource opportunities and challenges, prompting a different emphasis on access, efficiency, and renewable energy. The objective of this guidebook is to enhance the reader’s understanding of how to successfully develop, finance, construct, and operate utility-scale solar PV power plants. The guidebook focuses on aspects of project development that are specific to solar. From this perspective it covers all aspects of the overall project development process including site identification, plant design, energy yield, permits and licenses, contractual arrangements, and financing, giving sparser coverage to general project development basics that are not specific to solar. This guide covers the key building blocks to developing a successful utility-scale solar power project (the threshold for utility-scale depends on the market, but generally at least 5 megawatt (MW).Publication Caribbean Regional Electricity Supply Options : Toward Greater Security, Renewables and Resilience(World Bank, 2011-01-01)The Caribbean region continues to be plagued by high and volatile fuel prices, with limited economies of scale or diversity in electricity supply. Although several studies have examined alternative resource options for the region, they often only consider solutions for individual countries in isolation. When one looks at the Caribbean, however, it is apparent that the short distances between islands and market sizes present opportunities to benefit from regional solutions. Indeed, increasing interconnection in the Caribbean could pave the way for greater energy security, a larger use of renewable and enhanced climate resilience. The idea of regional interconnections is not new: gas pipelines are widely used to interconnect gas supply with gas demand, and electricity market interconnections have become the norm around the world. However, this option does not appear to have received the attention it merits in the specific context of the Caribbean. While this study analyzes a small subset of the imaginable regional energy options for the Caribbean, it shows that regional solutions warrant further study. This synthesis report builds from the technical report that the World Bank commissioned from Nexant, entitled-Caribbean regional electricity generation, interconnection, and fuels supply strategy. It analyzes a range of regional options. Although further analysis is required, the hope is that this synthesis report will help to fuel the conversation about interconnected development pathways for the Caribbean.Publication Assessing Energy Price Induced Improvements in Efficiency of Capital in OECD Manufacturing Industries(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-06)To assess how capital stocks adapt to energy price changes, it is necessary to account for the impacts on different vintages of capital and to account separately for price-induced and autonomous improvements in the energy efficiency of capital stock. The results of econometric analysis for five manufacturing industries in 19 OECD countries between 1990 and 2005 indicate that higher energy prices resulted in smaller energy use due to both improved energy efficiency of capital stock and reduced demand for the energy input. The investment response to energy prices varied considerably across manufacturing industries, being more significant in energy-intensive sectors. The results of policy simulations indicate that a carbon tax can deliver significant reductions in energy consumption in the medium run with modest declines in energy-using capital stock.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Argentina Country Climate and Development Report(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-11)The Argentina Country Climate and Development Report (CCDR) explores opportunities and identifies trade-offs for aligning Argentina’s growth and poverty reduction policies with its commitments on, and its ability to withstand, climate change. It assesses how the country can: reduce its vulnerability to climate shocks through targeted public and private investments and adequation of social protection. The report also shows how Argentina can seize the benefits of a global decarbonization path to sustain a more robust economic growth through further development of Argentina’s potential for renewable energy, energy efficiency actions, the lithium value chain, as well as climate-smart agriculture (and land use) options. Given Argentina’s context, this CCDR focuses on win-win policies and investments, which have large co-benefits or can contribute to raising the country’s growth while helping to adapt the economy, also considering how human capital actions can accompany a just transition.Publication Digital Africa(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-03-13)All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. "Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs" shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing, digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, it can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth. These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at least 3G mobile internet service now cover 84 percent of Africa’s population, but only 22 percent uses such services. And the average African business lags in the use of smartphones and computers as well as more sophisticated digital technologies that catalyze further productivity gains. Two issues explain the usage gap: affordability of these new technologies and willingness to use them. For the 40 percent of Africans below the extreme poverty line, mobile data plans alone would cost one-third of their incomes—in addition to the price of access devices, apps, and electricity. Data plans for small- and medium-size businesses are also more expensive than in other regions. Moreover, shortcomings in the quality of internet services—and in the supply of attractive, skills-appropriate apps that promote entrepreneurship and raise earnings—dampen people’s willingness to use them. For those countries already using these technologies, the development payoffs are significant. New empirical studies for this report add to the rapidly growing evidence that mobile internet availability directly raises enterprise productivity, increases jobs, and reduces poverty throughout Africa. To realize these and other benefits more widely, Africa’s countries must implement complementary and mutually reinforcing policies to strengthen both consumers’ ability to pay and willingness to use digital technologies. These interventions must prioritize productive use to generate large numbers of inclusive jobs in a region poised to benefit from a massive, youthful workforce—one projected to become the world’s largest by the end of this century.Publication Morocco Economic Update, Winter 2025(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-04-03)Despite the drought causing a modest deceleration of overall GDP growth to 3.2 percent, the Moroccan economy has exhibited some encouraging trends in 2024. Non-agricultural growth has accelerated to an estimated 3.8 percent, driven by a revitalized industrial sector and a rebound in gross capital formation. Inflation has dropped below 1 percent, allowing Bank al-Maghrib to begin easing its monetary policy. While rural labor markets remain depressed, the economy has added close to 162,000 jobs in urban areas. Morocco’s external position remains strong overall, with a moderate current account deficit largely financed by growing foreign direct investment inflows, underpinned by solid investor confidence indicators. Despite significant spending pressures, the debt-to-GDP ratio is slowly declining.Publication World Development Report 2006(Washington, DC, 2005)This year’s Word Development Report (WDR), the twenty-eighth, looks at the role of equity in the development process. It defines equity in terms of two basic principles. The first is equal opportunities: that a person’s chances in life should be determined by his or her talents and efforts, rather than by pre-determined circumstances such as race, gender, social or family background. The second principle is the avoidance of extreme deprivation in outcomes, particularly in health, education and consumption levels. This principle thus includes the objective of poverty reduction. The report’s main message is that, in the long run, the pursuit of equity and the pursuit of economic prosperity are complementary. In addition to detailed chapters exploring these and related issues, the Report contains selected data from the World Development Indicators 2005‹an appendix of economic and social data for over 200 countries. This Report offers practical insights for policymakers, executives, scholars, and all those with an interest in economic development.Publication Classroom Assessment to Support Foundational Literacy(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-03-21)This document focuses primarily on how classroom assessment activities can measure students’ literacy skills as they progress along a learning trajectory towards reading fluently and with comprehension by the end of primary school grades. The document addresses considerations regarding the design and implementation of early grade reading classroom assessment, provides examples of assessment activities from a variety of countries and contexts, and discusses the importance of incorporating classroom assessment practices into teacher training and professional development opportunities for teachers. The structure of the document is as follows. The first section presents definitions and addresses basic questions on classroom assessment. Section 2 covers the intersection between assessment and early grade reading by discussing how learning assessment can measure early grade reading skills following the reading learning trajectory. Section 3 compares some of the most common early grade literacy assessment tools with respect to the early grade reading skills and developmental phases. Section 4 of the document addresses teacher training considerations in developing, scoring, and using early grade reading assessment. Additional issues in assessing reading skills in the classroom and using assessment results to improve teaching and learning are reviewed in section 5. Throughout the document, country cases are presented to demonstrate how assessment activities can be implemented in the classroom in different contexts.