Economics and Policy of Concentrating Solar Power Generation

This book provides an up-to-date analysis of state-of-the-art concentrating solar power (CSP) generation. It focuses on the economic analysis of CSP generation technologies as well as the policies that have been and are being used around the globe to support it. The book describes the industrial sectors whose products make up the solar field, including the traditional manufacturers of turbines and generators.The authors provide the main theoretical tools needed to comprehend the costs of CSP technologies compared to other competing technologies (both conventional and renewable) and discuss the conceptual rationale behind creating public support for these technologies and the costs of various promotional techniques. Further, the book examines the concepts from different disciplinary traditions in economics (including environmental, innovation, industrial and public), which are then combined and integrated for an analysis of the costs and policies of CSP electricity.Addressing the main findings and the challenges for future CSP, the book is a valuable resource for researchers and practitioners. It is also of use to industrial engineers, as it identifies the features of the sector’s supply chain value, rooted in and supported by an industrial economics approach.

Both Pere Mir-Artigues and Pablo del Río have 20 years’ experience in the economics and policies of renewable energy. Pablo del Río pursued postdoctoral research on renewable energy support schemes at Riso National Laboratory at the System Analysis Department in Denmark. Since 1999, he has actively participated in 7 European-funded projects on renewable energy promotion in the EU. He has published more than 80 papers in leading international journals, more than half of which are on renewable energy, and 6 of which were written with Professor Pere Mir-Artigues. In addition, both authors published a report on solar PV electricity policy in Spain for the International Institute for Sustainable Development (Geneva) and a book on the Economics and Policy of Solar PV generation (Springer, 2016). In 2013, Pere Mir-Artigues visited the Electricity Policy Research Group at Cambridge University. He also has experience in the public management of renewable electricity projects.Natàlia Caldés has been working as a senior researcher at the Energy System Analysis Unit of CIEMAT since 2004, where she leads the area of energy policies studies and socio-economic impact assessment at the Energy System Analysis Unit. Her main research activities focus on the area of energy and climate change policies and sustainability assessment of energy technologies. She has participated in more than 20 European Commission and national research projects and is the co-author of more than 33 papers and book chapters, most devoted to renewable energies and a number on CSP technology.