Bücher der Reihe Energiepolitik und Klimaschutz. Energy Policy and Climate Protection

Sevinj Amirova-Mammadova explores pipeline dynamics and natural gas supply within the southern gas corridor and provides an analysis of how policy interests and decisions of the state actors affect the current energy politics in the Caspian region.

This Open Access book examines the radioactive waste management policies of ten European countries: Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Most countries are in the process of planning and creating final storage solutions, while none has yet finalized this process. Over the past decades many countries have been renewing their decision-making processes and the institutions that support them. The book provides 16 lessons that may advance the future democratic decision-making process around radioactive waste management.

Bernd Hirschl analysiert in einer Multi-Level Policy-Analyse die deutsche Politik fur erneuerbare Energien im Strommarkt. Er identifiziert die relevanten Akteure und Faktoren und erlautert die Bezuge zur Energie- und Klimapolitik auf nationaler, europaischer und internationaler Ebene.

This open access book discusses the eroding economics of nuclear power for electricity generation as well as technical, legal, and political acceptance issues. Aside from technical risks, safety issues, and the unsolved problem of nuclear waste disposal, the economic performance is currently a major barrier.

Mit einem Geleitwort von PD Dr. Lutz Mez

The world is facing several serious challenges at the close of the fossil and nuclear energy regime: the limited resources of cheap conventional oil can only be surmounted by tapping unconventional oil reserves, e.g. deep sea oil. The explosion of the oil platform Deepwater Horizon in 2010 and the subsequent oil spill caused enormous damage, which even a year later cannot be fully estimated. Another even more important threat emanating from the fossil and nuclear energy regime has been brought to our attention by the Fukushima disaster. Last but not least, the problem of climate change caused by an increase in greenhouse gas emissions is looming, despite the fact that the international community has agreed on a considerable reduction of these emissions. Is this poor result of the Kyoto Protocol and the failure of successive climate conferences the consequence of a preference for the use of market-based instruments? The majority of climate scientists, economists, and politicians believe in the efficiency of "cap-and-trade" regulations. They even conceive them as a constituent ingredient of a "Green New Deal" or "Global Green Recovery". The contributions in this volume provide a critical examination of the theoretical foundations, the political implications, and the empirical experiences of the application of market mechanisms and financial instruments to climate policy.

Given the shortcomings of the Paris Agreement, Anja Zenker examines the potential of free trade benefits as an incentive mechanism for an effective and stable climate change cooperation of states.

Gas makes or breaks economies, as shown by the effects of the 2009 Ukraine/Russia gas supply crisis. He examines the interdependence between the domestic political structure of a gas import-dependent country and the price it paid for imports up to 2014, using the level of reliance on the dominant supplier as an indicator.

This book is the last part of a trilogy and concludes a long-term project that focussed on nuclear waste governance in 24 countries. the wicked problems of housing nuclear waste disposal facilities, public participation and public discourse, voluntarism and compensation in siting as well as the role of advisory bodies and commissions.

Energy efficiency contributes to the main objectives of energy policy in the European Union: energy security, cost effectiveness and environmental benefits. However, the efficiency potential remains widely untapped. Will White Certificate Instruments, a new framework instrument to foster end-use energy efficiency, help to close the energy efficiency gap? The analysis compares the political process of choosing and designing White Certificate Instruments in Italy, France and Great Britain. The book shows that the type of policy instrument as well as its image has an influence not only on agenda-setting but also on the policy instrument's effectiveness due to interactions with existing energy efficiency discourses, regulatory traditions and the prevailing policy style.

Angela Pohlmann analyses the social embeddedness of renewable energy production. Energy production instead is analyzed as an outcome of complex situations within which dynamic negotiation processes unfold.

By doing so, the author considers the ongoing structural transformation of the Eurasian continent against the backdrop of deepening commercial interconnectivity in Eurasia into broader areas of trade, supported by the rapid development of rail connectivity.

Jan Beermann addresses persistent research gaps in urban climate governance and North-South cooperation. He compares the form, processes and outcomes of four local climate protection projects conducted as part of German-Indian urban cooperation and explores the conditions associated with the success and/or failure in these initiatives. The study concludes that North-South city partnerships struggle to fully realise their potential to foster global climate protection efforts, specifically in terms of post-project sustainability, multi-level governance coordination, and mutuality. On the basis of these findings, practical policy recommendations on how to maximise the outcomes and broaden the scope of urban climate cooperation are provided.

Based on close to two hundred interviews with decision-makers, government officials, and industry stakeholders, Karoline Steinbacher presents the first in-depth enquiry into Germany's efforts of "exporting" its sustainable energy policies.

By using the example of Germany and Poland this multi-level policy dependency analysis by Marco Wedel researches constraints and dependencies of the European Integration of the promotion of renewable energy source electricity (RES-E). To gain insightful results, the author does not only take a look at the implementation effectiveness of the relevant Directive 2009/28/EC, but much more generally analyses the potentially conflicting polity implications of the entities involved, as well as their respective policy preferences and processes in light of RES-(E). Combined, these give rise to multi-level constraints and dependencies for the European Integration of RES-(E) promotion.  

Shabnam Mirsaeedi-Farahani analyzes Iran's interests in diversifying its energy sector, specifically electricity generation and consumption, between 1990 and 2011. She examines the policy discussions in the Iranian Parliament as well as policy development and implementation with respect to the electricity sector. One of the geopolitically crucial areas for both Iran's domestic development as well as its international influence has been its energy sector. The author assesses international policy pressures and domestic interests to evaluate the interplay of interests, actors, and strategies. While increasing domestic generation capacity, Iran has been able to further its regional interests and influences as well as to build a backbone for its industrialization endeavors.

Sandu-Daniel Kopp investigates whether carbon reduction targets are compatible with market-driven competition in gas (and power) industries, and whether security of supply is compatible with competitive markets. He examines the policy trade-offs which need to be made between the three different elements, and whether these policy judgements should be economically or politically based. The analysis shows the need for a complex set of politically determined options to protect (competitive) markets from price risks and emergency events and demonstrates that this has thus far failed the policy test. Overall, the author argues that the three major elements of EU energy policy are incompatible in important respects and thereby challenges much of the conventional wisdom of EU and Member State policies of the past decade.

This volume examines the national plans that ten Euratom countries plus Switzerland and the United States are developing to address high-level radioactive waste storage and disposal.

This is volume two of a comparative analysis of nuclear waste governance and public participation in decision-making regarding the storage and siting of high-level radioactive waste and spent fuel in different countries.

Comparing Nuclear Energy, Renewables, Automobility and Rare Earth Policy

Many international organizations and scholars hope to spur local climate action by orchestration, indirect and voluntary governance arrangements. Lena Bendlin looks beyond the apparent success of voluntary initiatives using the example of the Covenant of Mayors, often heralded as an exemplary multi-level EU initiative.