The impact of a feed-in tariff on wind power development in Germany

Abstract

We estimate the impact of a feed-in tariff for renewable power on wind power investment in Germany at the county level from 1996-2010 controlling for windiness and access to the electricity transmission grid. After the Renewable Energy Law (EEG) was passed in 2000, the feed-in tariff became linked to wind power potential, such that more windy locations received a lower incentive per unit of output. We find that a 1 e-cent/kWh increase in the feed-in tariff rate would increase additions to capacity at the national level by 764 MW per year from 1996-2010 or 1,528 MW per year from 2005-2010. We analyze counterfactual scenarios, in which a uniform incentive is offered instead of the wind-dependent EEG incentive. Significantly more wind power plants are installed along the northern coastal counties in the uniform incentive scenario. We find that while the uniform incentive results in greater total wind power output per installed capacity, the EEG is ultimately more efficient by achieving 1% greater wind power output per euro and 3.7% greater reductions in power sector emissions per euro. In addition, we find a significant response from investors to an EEG provision that shifted the cost of transmission system upgrades from wind power developers to grid operators in 2000. The lack of a signal on scarcity of transmission capacity has likely resulted in a distribution of wind power plants that makes suboptimal use of existing infrastructure, necessitating investment in new transmission corridors.

Using Porter’s Diamond Model to Assess the Competitiveness of Taiwan’s Solar Photovoltaic Industry

“…Y. Zhao et al, 2011); (c) preferential loans for key industries (G 3 ) provided by banks to enhance technology and development (Jia et al, 2016;Mir-Artigues & Río, 2014;Z. Y. Zhao et al, 2011); and (d) appropriate solar power feed-in tariff rates (G 4 ) set by the government (Hitaj & Löschel, 2019;Jia et al, 2016;Moore et al, 2013;Tongsopit, 2015;Ye et al, 2017).…”

The regional heterogeneity of wind power deployment: an empirical investigation of land-use policies in Germany and Sweden

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Regional Factors Driving the Deployment of Wind Energy in Spain

“…There is abundant literature on the empirical modeling of the drivers and barriers that determine the investment in installed capacity of wind power. Most of them study the effects of the various public policy instruments on investment in wind capacity [40][41][42][43][44], although they also include other technical and socioeconomic variables. For instance, the authors in reference [45] take into account policy factors, such as the level of policy support, the type of support scheme and changes in it, but they also include variables such as wind resource potential, electricity generation costs, administrative barriers, social acceptance, general investment climate, electricity demand, share of hydro and nuclear in electricity generation or the country area.…”