Periods Of High Prices Research Articles

Are vulnerable customers any different than their peers when exposed to critical peak pricing: Evidence from the U.S.

Recent broad-based deployment of Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) enables the opportunity for broader adoption of time-based rates, and the benefits that result have been sizable contributors to making the investments cost effective. However, some stakeholders have raised concerns about the assumptions underlying the benefits assessments in AMI business cases. Such concerns are especially acute for certain subpopulations of residential customers. Low income, elderly and chronically ill (i.e., vulnerable) customers are believed to have less load that can be shifted or reduced to capture bill savings, lack the know-how or wherewithal with which to curtail usage, likely have more limited financial resources which may compel them to avoid high priced periods by reducing electricity for essential usage potentially causing them physical harm, and more generally may be more adversely affected by higher bills, which might possibly result from certain forms of time-based rates. There is very limited existing literature that addresses these questions specifically with regard to vulnerable subpopulations. This paper, based on a larger report, extends the existing empirical literature on the experiences of low-income customers exposed to critical peak pricing, and provides the first glimpses into the experiences of the elderly and those who reported being chronically ill.

FLUCTUACIONES ESTACIONALES Y CÍCLICAS DE LOS PRECIOS DEL AZÚCAR EN MÉXICO

El análisis de las fluctuaciones del precio del azúcar es importante porque en periodos de bajos precios disminuye el ingreso del productor. Con el objetivo de hacer recomendaciones que permitan enfrentar la volatilidad de precios del azúcar estándar, se realizó un análisis para determinar los componentes estacionales y cíclicos de los precios al mayoreo del azúcar en el periodo de octubre de 2004 a septiembre de 2016, en las centrales de abasto de la Ciudad de México, Guadalajara y Monterrey. El conocimiento de los componentes del precio (tendencia, estacional, cíclico e irregular) es importante porque permite seleccionar la mejor política para enfrentar las fluctuaciones. Los resultados indican la existencia de un fuerte componente estacional con diferencias máximas en periodos de precios altos de 1.83, 1.65 y 1.78 $1 kg-1, entre los precios reales y desestacionalizados del azúcar estándar en septiembre de 2009 en las centrales de abasto de la Ciudad de México, Guadalajara y Monterrey, respectivamente. Las diferencias mínimas entre ambos precios en meses de precios bajos fueron de -0.95, -0.88 y -0.94 $ kg-1 en marzo de 2010 en las mismas centrales de abasto. También existe un fuerte componente cíclico, ya que en el periodo analizado se detectaron cuatro ciclos con una duración promedio de 19 meses. Por los efectos negativos que una volatilidad extrema pueda tener sobre el ingreso del productor serían recomendables políticas de control de la oferta como un envío constante de azúcar al mercado y la planeación de la superficie cosechada de caña de azúcar (Saccharum officinarum L.) a través del tiempo.

Linking European building activity with plague history

Variations in building activity reflect demographic, economic and social change during history. Tens of thousands of wooden constructions in Europe have been dendrochronologically dated in recent decades. We use the annually precise evidence from a unique dataset of 49 640 tree felling dates of historical constructions to reconstruct temporal changes in building activity between 1250 and 1699 CE across a large part of western and central Europe largely corresponding to the former Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation. Comparison with annual records of 9772 plague outbreaks shows that construction activity was significantly negatively correlated to the number of plague outbreaks, with the greatest decrease in construction following the larger outbreaks by three to four years after the start of the epidemics. Preceding the Black Death (1346–1353 CE) by five decades and the Great Famine (1315–1322 CE) by two decades, a significant decline in construction activity at c. 1300 CE is indicative of a societal crisis, associated with population stagnation or decline. Another dramatic decline in building activity coincides with the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648 CE) and confirms the devastating nature of this conflict. While construction activity was significantly lower during periods of high grain prices, no statistically robust relationship between the number of felling dates and past temperature or hydroclimate variations is found. This study demonstrates the value of dendrochronological felling dates as an indicator for times of crisis and prosperity during periods when documentary evidence is limited.

Economic value of underground natural gas storage for the Brazilian power sector

This paper aims at assessing the main obstacles to the development of underground natural gas storage (UGS) in Brazil and at identifying the conditions required for the feasibility of UGS projects in the country. The paper estimates the economic value of UGS facilities for the power sector in Brazil, considering the specificities of the Brazilian power and gas sectors. It is shown that the Brazilian gas demand does not have a seasonal characteristic; instead, the demand is volatile of a random nature associated with the demand from thermal power plants, which are complementary to hydropower generation. This paper has proved that there is an important economic value associated with the storage of gas in periods of low power prices and its consumption in period of high power prices. Finally, this paper argues that it is essential to seek mechanisms to include the economic value of UGS for the power sector into the UGS regulation and market design, as well as to explore the possibility of making gas storage a resource for the power sector operation.

Multi-objective optimal load dispatch of microgrid with stochastic access of electric vehicles

Abstract Large-scale uncoordinated charging of electric vehicles (EVs) will become a reality in the near future, which will have a great impact on the stability and security of power system operation. In this regard, this paper proposes a multi-objective optimal load dispatch model of microgrid with the stochastic access of EVs. The uncertainties of EVs are modeled by using the Monte Carlo simulation. The objective function of the model includes the operating cost, pollutant treatment cost and load variance. Distributed generations (DGs) are considered in the model, including photovoltaic (PV) array, wind turbine (WT), diesel engine (DE) and micro turbine (MT). In order to solve the proposed model effectively, an improved particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is proposed. Then we discuss the dispatch results under three different scheduling scenarios, i.e., uncoordinated charging scenario, coordinated charging scenario with and without DGs. The simulation results show that charging loads will be shifted form high-priced periods to low-priced periods under the coordinated charging mode of EVs, which can reduce daily costs by 3.09% and effectively improve the stability of power system operation. Meanwhile, the penetration of DGs can further reduce 6.43% of total cost by managing output of DGs. Further, the influence of cost weight factor on dispatch results is discussed. It illustrates that the cost weight factor is a trade-off between the total cost and the load variance. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the model under different charging situations.

IPO activity and market volatility

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to hypothesize two channels in which market volatility affects initial public offering (IPO) activity.Design/methodology/approachFirst, CEOs time the market for IPOs and volatility makes this decision process harder. Second, risk-averse IPO investors become more reluctant toward IPOs during periods of higher volatility for their after-IPO returns.FindingsThe authors provide evidence that higher market volatility leads to lower IPO activity, supporting these hypotheses. More importantly, the authors show that it is not the realized volatility, but rather the implied (expected) volatility, that causes lower IPO activity.Research limitations/implicationsWhile there may be many companies that are ready to have IPOs, they may be simply waiting for a more opportune time which may not necessarily be a period of high prices but of low volatility.Practical implicationsThe public policy prescription is clear: if IPOs are to be encouraged, then regulatory policies should be constructed with the aim of reducing volatility.Originality/valueThis study is the first (to the authors’ knowledge) to argue that it is not the realized volatility which most affects the IPO decisions of executives, entrepreneurs and investors.

Africa’s Unfolding Economic Transformation

Despite the continued deep challenges that the region is facing, mounting evidence points to profound economic transformation in sub-Saharan Africa since the early 2000s. The contributions in this special issue highlight three aspects of Africa’s unfolding economic transformation since 2000: remarkable progress for the region as a whole, highly uneven progress across countries, and unresolved questions about the sustainability of the transformations. The drivers of the region’s economic transformations are diverse, and include improved governance, strong agricultural growth in some countries, employment expansion in informal rural off-farm activities, strong local and foreign investment, a period of high global commodity prices, and policy reforms undertaken in earlier decades. Agricultural growth, by expanding job opportunities in the non-farm sectors through multiplier effects, is likely to remain an important driver of continued transformation, though it will increasingly need to rely on productivity growth rather than area expansion.

Energy cost minimization through optimization of EV, home and workplace battery storage

Besides grid-to-vehicle (G2V) and vehicle-to-grid (V2G) functions, the battery of an electric vehicle (EV) also has the specific feature of mobility. This means that EVs not only have the potential to utilize the storage of cheap electricity for use in high energy price periods, but can also transfer energy from one place to another place. Based on these special features of an EV battery, a new EV energy scheduling method has been developed and is described in this article. The approach is aimed at optimizing the utilization EV energy for EVs that are regularly used in multiple places. The objective is to minimize electricity costs from multiple meter points. This work applies real data in order to analyze the effectiveness of the method. The results show that by applying the control strategy presented in this paper at locations where the EVs are parked, the electricity cost can be reduced without shifting the demand and lowering customer’s satisfaction. The effects of PV size and number of EVs on our model are also analyzed in this paper. This model has the potential to be used by energy system designers as a new perspective to determine optimal sizes of generators or storage devices in energy systems.

Price variation of tomatoes and ginger in Giwa Market, Kaduna State, Nigeria

This study analysed price of tomatoes and ginger in Giwa market, Kaduna State to identify seasonal price patterns and their expected changes over time. The analytical approach in this study was based on the price multiplicative model. The study based preliminary on secondary data collected from NAERLS weekly commodity prices during period 2011-2015. The study found that the Grand Seasonal Index (GSI) showed a deviation from hundred, suggesting seasonality exists in the market for both commodities. The trend and variability of the seasonal index were also calculated and it revealed that the grand seasonal indexes of the commodities in the market were highly variable and this indicates minimal incentives for the rural farmers and marketers of ginger and tomato. Further the result indicated that tomato has the highest volatility than ginger in the market. Declining trends were obtained for majority of the months in both tomato and ginger marketing an indication of principle of supply and demand. The feasibility for storage were 20.71% and 21.44% for tomato and ginger respectively, implying that the producers/marketers of both tomato and ginger will make highest returns if they stored and sold to other (urban/international) markets during periods of high prices rather than selling at the rural market during harvests. Consequently, marketing of ginger and tomato in terms of better prices in these markets is less favorable. Hence recommendation of the implementation of seasonable price stability by the government. In addition, there is need to boost production, activate value chain, collecting and disseminating market information. Keywords: Price variations, grand seasonal index, tomato, ginger

Determining the chaotic behaviour of copper prices in the long-term using annual price data

Mineral commodity prices are influenced by economic, technological, psychological, and geopolitical factors. Stochastic approaches, and time series and econometric techniques have been used to represent the dynamics of mineral commodity markets and predict prices. However, these techniques cannot provide a comprehensive representation of market dynamics because they do not recognise the relationship between these factors over time, and they are unable to capture both the evolution and the cumulative effects of these factors on prices. Stability of motion and chaos theories can detect sensitivity to initial conditions, and therefore the evolutionary patterns allowing a proper understanding and representation of mineral commodity market dynamics. Most of the techniques used to assess chaos require a colossal amount of data, so the use of small data sets to assess chaos has been largely criticised. Nevertheless, by definition, the dynamics of a chaotic system remain at different scales owing to its self-organisation features that exhibit ordered patterns in the absence of codes or rules. Therefore, any deterministic chaotic behaviour of mineral commodity prices can be captured by using small data sets if a detailed qualitative and quantitative analysis are carried out. This paper examines the chaotic behaviour of annual copper prices between 1900 and 2015. To do so, we combine chaos theory, stability of motion and statistical techniques to reconstruct the long-term dynamics of copper prices. First, we examine the time dependency and the presence of a strange attractor by a visual analysis of the time series and phase space reconstruction based on Takens’ theorem and determine embedding parameters. Then we examine the dynamic characteristics of the system which assesses its complexity and regularity patterns to measure the system’s entropy. Finally, we calculate the largest Lyapunov exponent λ to assess the sensitivity to initial conditions and determine chaotic behaviour supported by a surrogate test. We find that annual copper prices have a chaotic behaviour embedded in a high-dimensional space and short time delay. The study suggests that copper prices exhibit only a single state of low prices, which fluctuate through transitional periods of high prices. It challenges the assertion that metal markets have fluctuated over four major super cycles and debate the adequacy of stochastic and econometric models for representing mineral commodity market behaviour.This study recommends that the use of chaotic behaviour improves our understanding of mineral commodity markets and narrows the data searching, processing and monitoring requirements for forecasting. Therefore, it improves the performance of traditional techniques for selecting key factors that influence the market dynamics, and may also be used to select the most suitable algorithm for forecasting prices.

High productivity of soilless strawberry cultivation under rain shelters

Abstract The effect of rain shelters on the performance of the day-neutral strawberry (Fragaria × ananassa) Monterey cultivar was studied in northern Quebec in trials extending over 2 years. The main objective of the study was to evaluate the benefits of growing strawberry crops under plastic rain shelters in terms of yield, fruit quality, disease incidence and economical returns for soilless strawberry production. Five treatments were carried out and these included four − under rain shelters cultivation (T1 to T4) and one under open-air conditions (the Control, C). Under rain shelters conditions, plants were grown in either peat (PE; T1 treatment) or peat-sawdust (PS25; T2 treatment) substrates. Early forcing of bare-root plants (T3) in combination with a rain shelter cover was also carried out in an attempt to generate consistent early yields by the end of July as such would allow producers to capture a niche market for strawberries in Quebec. Finally in T4, the PE substrate was laid onto a capillary mat to determine the potential of sub-surface water retention technology to minimize water use. In comparison to the Control treatment, protected cultivation led to a significantly lower incidence of strawberry mildew [Sphaerotheca macularis (Wall. ex Fries)] and consistently higher marketable yields which largely compensated for the initial costs associated with the rain shelters. When grown under greenhouse conditions, forced plants had a significant production peak earlier, coinciding with the period of high prices for fresh strawberries in 2013. However, the economical analysis revealed that this method was not always profitable. Balancing economical and environmental considerations, the conditions of the T4 treatment were found to be best for generating both consistent water savings and profits (CAD $ 724–1356 per 0.1 ha) compared to the Control. Taken together, our results highlight the potential for rain shelters for soilless strawberry production, and should be a more profitable and environmentally friendly cultivation method for strawberry producers.

SOUTH-SOUTH COOPERATION IN THE CHÁVEZ ERA IN VENEZUELA

South-South Cooperation (SSC) has become one of the major trends in the International Relations of the new millennium. Initiatives of political cooperation, economic and technical assistance can be traced back to the 1960’s, for example the Bandung Conference of non-aligned countries or the creation of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) under Ra u l Prebisch’s aegis [Braveboy-Wagner 2009; Prebisch 1954, 1969]. Nevertheless, the emergence of China and the BRICS and a new period of high oil prices have produced an increased involvement of middle-income states in initiatives of cooperation with other countries of the Global South. Venezuela has been an actor in this wave of SSC during the government of Hugo Ch a vez. Certainly, SSC is not new in the Venezuelan external relations because Caracas implemented programs of cooperation to supply oil in special conditions to some Central American and Caribbean countries since the 1970’s. Example of this were the Puerto Ordaz Agreement, approved during the Carlos Andr e s P e rez administration (1974-1979) and the San Jos e Agreement, a Venezuelan-Mexican initiative implemented in the early 1980’s [Grayson 1985]. Similarly, Carlos Andr e s P e rez played a role in the promotion of a New International Economic Order and in the establishment of the Latin American Economic System (known in Spanish as SELA) [P e rez 1980, 1983]. However, the logic of Venezuelan South-South cooperation was transformed since the rise to power of Ch a vez in 1999 and in particular after his victory in the recall referendum convened in 2004. Ch a vez aimed to transform the Venezuelan foreign policy since the beginning of his government. One of his goals was obviously the deepening of the relations with the Global South. Venezuela as a middle-income country became a driver in the new dynamics of SSC both in Latin America and the Caribbean and beyond the Western Hemisphere. This paper analyses this increasing involvement of Venezuela in initiatives of SCC, in particular the reasons that led Ch a vez to promote those initiatives. Due to the particular narrative furthered by the Venezuelan government to explain its SSC agenda, supposedly based on solidarity, complementarity and cooperation, this paper compares Venezuelan strategy of international cooperation with more traditional forms of North-South Cooperation (NSC). To achieve such a goal, a qualitative methodology is used in the paper based on the review of the literature on international cooperation and on the evaluation of international cooperation promoted by the Venezuelan government.

Smart management of distinct plug-in hybrid electric vehicle charging stations considering mobility pattern and site characteristics

Summary Management of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) is an important alternative energy solution to accord the prevailing environmental depletion. However, adding PHEVs to the existing distribution network may stimulate issues such as increase in peak load, power loss, and voltage deviation. Addressing the aforementioned issues by incorporating distinct mobility patterns together will develop an attractive energy management. In this paper, suitable location of the charging station is presented for a novel 2-area distribution system following distinct mobility patterns. A comprehensive study by considering the optimal, midst, and unfit site for placing the charging station is incorporated. For managing the charging sequence of PHEVs, a meta-heuristic solving tool is developed. The main contribution of this programming model is its ability to schedule the vehicles simultaneously in both the areas. The efficiency of the proposed energy management framework is evaluated on the IEEE 33-bus and IEEE 69-bus distribution systems. The test system is subjected to different scenarios for demonstrating the superior performance of the proposed solving tool in satisfying the convenience of vehicle owner along with reducing the peak demand. The results show that charging at low electricity price period and discharging at high electricity price period enables the minimum operational cost.

Accumulating through food crisis? Farmers, commodity traders and the distributional politics of financialization

ABSTRACTThis paper considers the domestic and international ramifications of financialization and grain price instability in the US agri-food sector. It finds that during the recent period of high and volatile prices, the average income of large-scale farms reached the earnings threshold of the top percentile of US households, and agricultural commodity traders markedly outperformed other corporate groups. In contrast, small-scale farms, particularly those involved in cattle and wheat production, have struggled to manage the uncertainty brought by price tumult. The paper goes on to examine the role that these uneven distributional dynamics play in debates around how hedging and speculation should be defined and regulated in the wake of the food crisis of 2007–08. It shows that a coalition of small-scale farmers has actively pushed for a far-reaching definition of speculation and concomitantly wide-ranging curbs on what they deem to be speculative activity. Conversely, the major commodity traders and a plurality of organizations representing large-scale grain producers have called for a narrower interpretation of speculation which leaves the extant regulatory regime largely in place. With these insights, I suggest that financialization and associated price volatility tend to reinforce inequality in rural America while possibly exacerbating social instability and hardship abroad.

Enabling Distributed Energy Storage by Incentivizing Small Load Shifts

Reducing peak demands and achieving a high penetration of renewable energy sources are important goals in achieving a smarter grid. To reduce peak demand, utilities are introducing variable rate electricity prices to incentivize consumers to manually shift their demand to low-price periods. Consumers may also use energy storage to automatically shift their demand by storing energy during low-price periods for use during high-price periods. Unfortunately, variable rate pricing provides only a weak incentive for distributed energy storage and does not promote its adoption at large scales. In this article, we present the storage adoption dilemma to capture the problems with incentivizing energy storage using variable rate prices. To address the problem, we propose a simple pricing scheme, called flat-power pricing , which incentivizes consumers to shift small amounts of load to flatten their demand rather than shift as much of their power usage as possible to low-price, off-peak periods. We show that compared to variable rate pricing, flat-power pricing (i) reduces consumers’ upfront capital costs, as it requires significantly less storage capacity per consumer; (ii) increases energy storage’s return on investment, as it mitigates free riding and maintains the incentive to use energy storage at large scales; and (iii) uses aggregate storage capacity within 31% of an optimal centralized approach. In addition, unlike variable rate pricing, we also show that flat-power pricing incentivizes the scheduling of elastic background loads, such as air conditioners and heaters, to reduce peak demand. We evaluate our approach using real smart meter data from 14,000 homes in a small town.

Subsidy and natural resource curse: Evidence from plant level observations in Iran

Using plant level panel data of manufacturing firms in Iran from 2003 to 2013, we test the Dutch disease predictions, including the impact of a rise in oil prices on intensive and extensive margins of trade. Our findings indicate that during periods of high oil prices domestic currency appreciates, but contrary to resource curse theories, domestic firms export more, and new firms enter foreign markets. We reconcile this paradox by proposing a new channel, which we call “subsidy disease.” Despite rising oil prices, the government of Iran kept domestic energy prices at low levels, which increased the implicit subsidy accruing to energy intensive firms. In effect, these firms gain a competitive advantage in foreign markets because of the increased subsidy. We show that energy intensive plants export more when the oil price is high. Moreover, consistent with natural resource curse models, we show that the average wage increases during periods of high oil prices, but much less for exporting firms. We also find robust evidence that high oil prices reduce investments of manufacturing firms.

Price Responsive Demand Management of an Industrial Buyer in Day-ahead Electricity Market

AbstractAn industrial buyer, who can reschedule its production plan, may develop strategic bid by shifting its demand from high price period to low price period. Based on this concept, a new optimization formulation has been proposed to develop bidding strategy of such buyers considering Price Responsive Demand Shifting (PRDS). Since the bidding strategy of the buyer depends upon the market clearing price, which is volatile/uncertain due to various factors like gaming behavior of participants, demand forecasting error, transmission congestion etc, the proposed optimization problem is formulated as a stochastic linear problem, comprising of two sub-problems. The first sub-problem represents the market clearing process by the System Operator, which is formulated to maximize the social welfare of the market participants, while the second sub-problem aims at maximizing the purchase cost saving of the industrial buyer. The optimal bidding strategy has been obtained by solving these two sub-problems considering hourly market clearing for 24-hour scheduling period. The effectiveness of the proposed method has been tested on a 5-bus system and modified IEEE 30-bus system. Results obtained with the demand shifting based bidding strategy have been compared with those obtained with a Conventional Price Quantity (CPQ) bid strategy. It has been observed that the proposed approach leads to enhancement in the purchase cost saving as compared to the CPQ and meets the energy consumption targets of the industrial buyer.

Decentral Energy Control in a Flexible Production to Balance Energy Supply and Demand

A volatile energy supply sector with fluctuating energy prices poses new challenges to sustainable and cost efficient manufacturing. To ensure a stable and cost efficient energy supply in the industrial energy system, energy supply as well as the demand for manufacturing has to be balanced. The goal is to use energy when it is cheap and provide energy or use less energy during periods of high energy prices. Achieving this goal is strongly limited by ensuring the production performance especially the delivery time and the output and depends on the flexibility of the production. While smart grids provide solutions for balancing supply and demand for regional and higher structured energy networks, solutions in an industrial energy environment are missing. This paper presents the ongoing research concerned with the development of a decentral system including methods and control units to autonomous control an industrial energy system with fluctuating prices. The system will ensure production performance while decreasing energy cost through balancing energy demand and supply. For this purpose, the control units will measure the energy available inside the system. This information has to be balanced with the actual production order situation of each single machine. Based on this comparison, the control units will decide autonomously, considering different production relative parameters, to produce or to wait for more, cheaper energy in the network.

Saudi Arabia in Transition: Insights on Social, Political, Economic, and Religious Change

Saudi Arabia in Transition: Insights on Social, Political, Economic, and Religious Change

Sovereign bonds in developing countries: Drivers of issuance and spreads

In the last decade there has been a new wave of sovereign bond issuances in Africa. What determines the ability of developing countries to issue bonds in international capital and what explains the spreads on these bonds? This paper examines these questions using a dataset that includes 105 developing countries during the period 1995–2014. We find that a country is more likely to issue a bond when, in comparison with non-issuing peers, it is larger in economic size, has higher per capita GDP, a lower public debt, and a more effective government. Spreads on sovereign bonds are lower for countries with strong external and fiscal positions, as well as robust economic growth and government effectiveness. We also find that primary spreads for the average Sub-Saharan African issuer are higher than in other regions. With regard to global factors, our results confirm the existing evidence that issuances are more likely during periods of global liquidity and high commodity prices, especially for Sub-Saharan African countries, and spreads are higher in periods of higher market volatility.