Michael Giberson From the most recent American Law and Economics Review, “Retail Gasoline Price Ceilings and Regulatory Capture: Evidence from Canada.” The authors find statistical support for the conclusion that “the enactment of [price ceiling] regulation is correlated with a 1–1.2 cents per liter rise in self-service retail gasoline prices, controlling for all else.” They …
Michael Giberson Laylan Copelin, reporting for the Austin American-Statesman, documents the power system resource issues currently troubling state utility regulators in Texas: “State set to grapple again with question: How to encourage more private-sector power generation?” Texas suffered one rolling blackout last winter and narrowly avoided another this summer. The weather extremes might have exposed …
Michael Giberson Bob Jenks of Oregon’s Citizens’ Utility Board, writing at EnergyPulse, explains “Why Smart Grid Advocates Should Learn About Utility Regulation.” Reading between the lines a bit, the reason smart grid advocates should learn about utility regulation seems to be so that they will understand that their talent, inventiveness, and desire to make the …
The Smart Grid and the Regulatory Barriers Thereto Read More »
Michael Giberson I’m writing in praise of a New York Times article on natural gas fracking. Yes, really! Even more surprising, I’m writing in praise of a New York Times on fracking written by Ian Urbina. Yes, really! What is this marvel, you ask? I answer, “Rush to Drill for Natural Gas Creates Conflicts With Mortgages.” What is so …
Michael Giberson Two multi-billion dollar deals in the news this weekend provide additional evidence of how advances in drilling technology have unlocked vast new energy resources and are reshaping the energy industry. Norwegian oil company Statoil is paying about $4.4 billion for Brigham Exploration, getting “a stronger foothold in unconventional resources” according to the Wall …
Michael Giberson Michael Levi, at his CFR blog, explains “What The Nobel Prize Tells Us About Oil“: Do you think that it’s straightforward to figure out whether high oil prices cause recessions? Many people apparently do. The 2011 Nobel Prize in Economics, awarded today to Thomas Sargent and Christopher Sims for “empirical research on cause and effect in the macroeconomy”, should make …
Michael Giberson Congress asked the National Research Council to evaluate the economics and environmental effects of the advanced biofuels mandate in the Renewable Fuels Standard (“RFS2”). The result? It isn’t pretty: barring unforeseen technological advances that dramatically reduce costs or oil prices consistently in the neighborhood of $190 a barrel or higher, RFS2 just doesn’t …
Michael Giberson The story in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal on the link between gasoline prices and crude oil prices was a bit frustrating. The article does a reasonable job explaining key pieces of the puzzle, but then fails to assemble the puzzle into something resembling reality. The story is headlined, “Gas Stays High as Oil …
The Wsj’s Confused Story on Gasoline Prices and Crude Oil Prices Read More »
Michael Giberson In a post at the Master Resource blog I point out another problem with anti-price gouging laws: during actual emergency conditions both state governments and consumers likely have much more important things to do that worry about whether particular price increases are unconscionable under the state’s understanding of that term. Among other points, …
Price Gouging Laws Wasted Resources During the Hurricane Irene Emergency Read More »
Michael Giberson A working paper from the UC-Berkeley Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics says that the demand for gasoline is more price-inelastic than typically thought. Here is the abstract, which points to publication selection bias as the culprit: One of the most frequently examined statistical relationships in energy economics has been the price elasticity …
Demand for Gasoline is More Price-inelastic Than Commonly Thought Read More »
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