The Swedish system for subsidizing renewable energy is a public financial loss. Consumers carry the financial burden through their electric bill and its certificate fee.
CERE Professors Bengt Kriström and Per-Olov Johansson let us in Dagens industri, August 26th 2019 know more about their cost-benefit analysis of the green certificate for renewable energy: “Our analysis show that the system for green certificates for renewable energy introduced in Sweden is not profitable for the public finance. Also, it is the consumers who pay the prize through increased electric bills via the green certificate fee.” (click on headline to read more)
The environmental taxes are criticized in fPLUS August 23, 2019 for damaging Swedish companies and failing to help the environment. One of the interviewees is CERE’s Runar Brännlund.
“The three environmental taxes identified as particularly unfortunate are: bonus-malus system on cars, air tax and chemical tax. Runar Brännlund, Professor of Economics at Umeå University says to fPlus that the environmental taxes completely miss the target. – Most of our environmental taxes are not even environmental taxes. They do not address the actual environmental issues in a good way. They are therefore more fiscal than governing.”
The August issue of Forest Policy and Economics contains not one but two papers by recent CERE grads Jinggang Guo and Brian Danley. Jinggang, specializing in forest sector modelling, defended his thesis on October 12, 2018. Just a few months later on January 25, 2019, Brian Danley defended his thesis on ecosystem services and forest policy. Apart from publishing in the same issue of the same journal, and defending in close proximity, they have also both chosen to spend the next chapter of their research careers in the US.
CERE Professors Bengt Kriström and Per-Olov Johansson claim on Dagens industry (Industry Today) debate, June 20th, 2019 that Swedish air travelers are being taxed three times over. This while decreased emissions in Sweden means increased emissions somewhere else in the EES due to EU-ETS. This also means cheaper emission permits between other foreign EES airports as well as cheaper flight tickets.
CERE's Runar Brännlund took on June 15th, 2019 part of a discussion regarding the planned battery factory in Skellefteå. Will it boost Norrland or will the revenues end up somewhere else? Runar finds it hard to believe that it will have any kind of influence on the large area that is Norrland, but if all goes as planned, it will certainly be a boost for Skellefteå and its vicinity.
The program is only available in Swedish. Runar can be heard 4.10 and 8.09 minutes into the program.
