Electricity and Markets
讨论了电力行业从垂直整合转向市场组织后，不同市场设计如何影响发电容量投资，以及排放交易对电价的意外影响。
Over the last fifteen years, an increasing number of electricity industries have replaced vertical integration with markets as the main method of organising production. Electrical energy is traded in many European and US markets, while the US also has markets for generating capacity. US generators can reduce the cost of complying with environmental regulations by trading emissions of sulphur dioxide, while Europe has just started a carbon dioxide emissions trading scheme. This article discusses the way in which these markets put economic principles into practice. In particular, it shows that several different market designs can provide theoretically equivalent incentives for generators to build capacity, and that emissions trading may have unexpected impacts upon electricity prices.