Benefit-Cost Analysis Applied to Renewable-Energy R and D: Issues, Guidelines, and Application of a Benefit Measure

摘要

The purpose of this report is to provide guidelines and suggest a procedure for the application of traditional benefit-cost analysis to the evaluation of renewable energy research and development programs. This is done after a review of past and current efforts to evaluate research and development activities in both the public and private sectors and after a careful survey of the literature to reveal major issues associated with the application of benefit-cost analysis to energy research and development. The emphasis is on US Department of Energy program-level activities rather than individual projects. The suggested procedure relies heavily on projected costs and levels of energy production for various renewable energy technologies. In estimating benefits, a case is made for relying primarily on direct measures of energy cost savings with other benefits discussed outside of the traditional benefit-cost framework. To demonstrate its usefulness, the procedure is applied to existing estimates of energy cost savings and future production projections for a variety of renewable energy programs. (ERA citation 07:054135)