Review of economic modelling for quantifying the environmental impacts of renewable energy sources

Abstract

Global attention has always focused on pollution and depletion of fossil fuels associated with the conventional energy sources. The non-conventional energy/renewable energy technologies (RETs) have always been considered clean and environmental friendly. The slow deployment of RETs such as wind and solar is associated with some environmental impacts such as use of large tracts of land which would otherwise be used for other economic activities for revenue generation such as agriculture, archaeological sites, forests etc. The impacts of RETs are evaluated in terms of the area impacted and damaging effect caused on the impacted area effectively leading to the loss of revenue. The impacts are quantified in terms of the ecosystem available in the area which varies from one region to the other. The research in this paper unveils the externalities which are unplanned, unwanted or unanticipated during construction and running of RETS yet they are not accounted for in the determination of COE and other cost parameters in many economic modelling tools.