Agent-Based Models of Energy Investment Decisions

ISBN-13: 9783790825442 / Angielski / Miękka / 2010 / 113 str.

Tobias Wittmann

Opis

As societies face the challenge of securing an efficient and environmentally sound energy supply, researchers have strived to determine the future development of energy consumption, infrastructure and technology endowment. This book proposes a new agent-based approach to studying the development of urban energy systems. Decisions of private and commercial investors and operators are modeled using a bounded rational decision model which are parameterized by socio-economic data. The study goes on to analyze the impact of firms' competition on technology diffusion and calculate diffusion curves for energy technologies such as solar collectors, boilers and efficiency upgrades for buildings. While making an important methodological contribution to the field of energy modelling, the author also presents practical results which will help urban planners and policy makers take more accurate decisions. As societies face the challenge of securing an efficient and environmentally sound energy supply, researchers have strived to determine the future development of energy consumption, infrastructure and technology resources. This book proposes a new agent-based approach to studying the development of urban energy systems. Decisions of private and commercial investors and operators are modeled using a bounded rational decision model which are parameterized by socio-economic data. The study goes on to analyze the impact of firms' competition on technology diffusion and to calculate diffusion curves for energy technologies such as solar collectors, boilers and efficiency upgrades for buildings. While making an important methodological contribution to the field of energy modeling, the author also presents practical results, which will help policy makers and urban planners make more accurate decisions.

Spis treści

1 Drivers of Change and Energy Models, - 1.1 Introduction,- 1.2 Drivers of Change,- 1.3 Energy Models - a Review of the State of the Art,- 1.4 Motivation and Research Questions,- 2 Model Design,- 2.1 Introduction,- 2.2 Users and Intentions,- 2.3 Geographical and Socio-economic Scope,- 2.4 The Layer Concept,- 2.5 Discussion,- 3 Private Actor Model,- 3.1 Introduction,- 3.2 Private Energy Investment Decisions,- 3.4 Modeling Private Energy Investment Decisions,- 3.5 Results, -3.6 Discussion,- 4 Commercial Actor Model,- 4.1 Introduction,- 4.2 Commercial Energy Investment Decisions,- 4.3 Aggregation of the Firm,- 4.4 Decisions Model,- 4.5 Application and Results,- 4.6 Discussion,- 5 Conclusions,- 5.1 Introduction,- 5.2 Discussion of the Model Design,- 5.3 Outlook,- Appendix,- A.1 Private Actor Model,- A.2 Commercial Actor Model

Blurb

This book demonstrates how bounded rational decision models can be standardized and parameterized by socio-economic data. Focusing on private energy technology investment decisions, the author shows how different representative agents can be constructed using search rules, analysis tools and decision strategies. Diffusion curves for energy technologies such as solar collectors, boilers and efficiency upgrades for buildings are calculated. Further, the model is extended to study the impact of firms’ competition on technology diffusion. The modeling approach presented in this book may serve as a template for applications in other domain.