Policy brief: As the dramatic consequences of climate change are starting to unfold, addressing the intermittency of low-carbon energy sources, such as solar and wind, is crucial. The obvious solution to intermittency is energy storage. However, its constraints and implications are far from trivial. Developing and facilitating energy storage is associated with technological difficulties as well as economic and regulatory problems that need to be addressed to spur investments and foster competition. With these issues in mind, the annual Energy Talk, organized by the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics, invited three experts to discuss the challenges and opportunities of energy storage.

Policy brief: The COVID-19 pandemic has drawn attention to a pre-existing threat to global health: the quality of air in cities around the world. Prolonged exposure to air pollution has been found to increase the mortality rate of COVID-19. This is a particular concern for much of Eastern Europe, where emissions regularly exceed safe levels.

Working paper: Can we improve the potential for information to induce individual climate-change curbing action by focusing on individual types? In this paper Maria Perrotta Berlin, Assistant Professor at SITE, and her co-author try to contribute to the understanding of the persistence and increase of meat eating in the face of mounting evidence on the ills of meat production and consumption by considering the role of selective attention and learning.

Today’s international markets are saturated with overwhelming concerns about issues related to the environment, specifically with issues related to how business intersects with environmental conservation. Consumers are becoming more and more prone to purchase products that consider the environment and sustainability, and they are more willing to pay the premium price tag that comes along with supporting those sustainability efforts. This growing concern has inspired manufacturing firms to develop more effective environmental management practices as they innovate newer and better products.

This year’s SITE Energy Talks – Energy Demand Management: Insights from Behavioral Economics, was devoted to discussing how consumers make energy efficiency decisions and what incentives can be used to change consumer behaviour.

Thomas Sterner, Professor of Environmental Economics at the University of Gothenburg, gave a presentation on technological development, geopolitical and environmental issues in our energy future at SITE Energy Talks, concerning the rapidly increasing level of carbon content, new technological development, the impact of low oil prices and the most promising ways to stop emissions.

by Chloé Le Coq and Elena Paltseva, forthcoming as a chapter in "Russian Energy and Security up to 2030", edited by Susanne Oxenstierna and Veli-Pekka Tynkkynen, Roothledge

by Chloé Le Coq and Elena Paltseva, published in the Energy Policy

by Jesper Roine (with A. Boschini and J. Pettersson), published in Scandinavian Journal of Economics