The Role of Municipal Energy Companies in Sustainable Local Energy Systems
Abstract: When constructing sustainable energy systems the local level of implementation is veryimportant, and yet sometimes neglected. This thesis focuses on the local implementationof Swedish policy for energy and environment. Municipally owned energy companieshave a large responsibility in developing sustainable local energy systems as theirbusiness lies between local policy, described in the municipal energy plans, and thecompetitive energy markets for electricity and heat.The thesis investigates the role of policy, national and local, and how the policy governsthe environmental efforts of the municipal energy companies, related to the nationalenvironmental quality objectives. A case study of three municipalities in the westernpart of Sweden shows that the companies are often important actors when developingthe municipal energy plan and that the companies have a large degree of freedom whenplanning future investments. The directives from the owners, the municipalities, areoften vague and only sometimes use clearly defined indicators to evaluate thedevelopment of the local energy system and its environmental impact. Business areas inwhich the companies have had great success include district heating which often hasachieved a large share of the heat market, whereas wind power seems to be a difficultissue for the companies to engage, even though the companies generally seem to have alarge acceptance for their activities locally. Energy plans could further stress the needfor evaluation of investments and system development using properly definedindicators, which can easily be adopted from the national indicators in theenvironmental quality objective system.
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