Not Just Energy Savings: Emerging Regulatory Challenges from the Implementation of Tradable White Certificates

Panel: Energy and Environmental Policy: Planning for Greater Impacts

Author:
Marcella Pavan, Italian Regulatory Authority for Electricity and Gas (AEEG)

Abstract

White certificates have become very popular in the international debate as one of the most effective policy tools to promote investments in energy-efficiency technologies. The literature has developed quite rapidly in the last few years, around three broad research areas: a) the analysis of the major design options of such a tool (e.g.: choice of targets, target actors, eligible projects, M&V); b) the comparison of different existing national schemes; and c) the theoretical analysis of the inter-relationships with other policy instruments.

The implementation and monitoring of white certificates trading schemes confirms the relevance of some regulatory choices concerning ‘traditional' technical questions extensively debated in this literature, but also draws attention to further regulatory issues: trading rules, costrecovery and enforcement mechanism, the possible inter-relations among these components and the associated regulatory trade-offs. The paper focuses on these regulatory issues via a critical assessment of the results achieved to date by the Italian white certificates scheme and a discussion of the latest developments in the legislative and regulatory framework.