The Impact of Renewable Energy on the EU Electricity Prices and CO2 Emissions

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2015 in the subject Energy Sciences, grade: 2.0, Charles University in Prague (Faculty of Social Sciences), course: Institute of Economic Studies, language: English, abstract: This work is focused on the topic of electricity pricing in the EU connected with the increasing use of renewable energy sources in electricity production and consumption. It provides background information related to the types of energy sources along with a summary of their benefits and drawbacks regarding both the environmental impact and financial costs. Furthermore, it involves both world and European electricity production statistics followed by an overview of the EU approach concerning the support of environment-friendly energy production methods.

The core of the thesis is then an econometric panel data analysis based on the data collected from 13 member states of the EU over the period between 2010 and 2013 analysing two relationships. First, the impact of the share of renewable energy sources in the final electricity production on the European consumer electricity prices. Second, whether the replacement of fossil fuels by renewable energy sources causes a significant decrease in the CO2 emissions.

In conclusion, this paper provides suggestions for further research based on the undertaken analyses. The results of the panel data analysis presented suggest that household electricity prices in the studied EU member states increase with the deployment of electricity production from renewable sources, as expected. On the contrary, a significant negative effect of the renewables used in the EU energy consumption on the CO2 emissions produced was found by the model regression.