Publications

Moving Saudi Arabia’s Role in the Global Methane Pledge Forward

Rami Shabaneh, Bertrand Rioux, Fahad Bin Haji

In our previous Instant Insight, The Global Methane Pledge: What It Means for the Oil and Gas Industry Post-COP26, we shed light on the increased momentum behind the issue of methane emissions and how it is taking center stage in…

Shabaneh, Rami

Rioux, Bertrand

Fahad Bin Haji

Potential implications of the EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism

Bertrand Rioux, Dongmei Chen

From 2023 onward, the European Union’s (EU’s) Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) will require importers to declare the embedded carbon emissions of electricity, iron, steel, aluminum, cement and fertilizers. The CBAM will ultimately transition into a carbon import tax, with…

Rioux, Bertrand

Chen, Dongmei

Cooperate or Compete? Insights from Simulating a Global Oil Market with No Residual Supplier

IAEE

Bertrand Rioux, Axel Pierru, Abdullah AlJarboua, Fatih Karanfil, Shahd Alrashed, Colin Ward

Integrated Oil Companies and the Requiem for a Transition: How Are They Coping with Climate Change?

Majed A. Al Suwailem, Bertrand Rioux

Integrated oil and gas (O&G) companies operate vertically integrated businesses that span the O&G value chain. In this way, they can leverage expertise across multiple domains rather than just focusing on exploration and production (E&P). Examples of such companies include…

Al Suwailem, Majed A.

Rioux, Bertrand

An Economic Analysis of Gas Pipeline Trade Cooperation in the GCC

Science Direct

Rami Shabaneh, Bertrand Rioux, Steve Griffiths

Economic Analysis of Gas Pipeline Trade Cooperation: A GCC case study

Bertrand Rioux, Rami Shabaneh, Steve Griffiths

Natural gas development across the member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) — including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain —has become a priority for achieving long-term energy security and for supporting economic…

Rioux, Bertrand

Shabaneh, Rami

Griffiths, Steve

Assessing the Impact of Stablecoins on the International Monetary System: G20 and IMF to Study the Impact of Facebook’s Libra Project

T20

Stablecoins are an alternative digital currency that is pegged to a basket of traditional currencies and other assets. They are designed to address the shortcomings of first-generation cryptocurrencies in providing adequate monetary services. They represent a disruptor to the payment…

Fatima Yousef Al Sebaie, Eiji Ogawa, Jose Siaba Serrate, Bertrand Rioux

Can Cooperation Enhance Natural Gas Utilization in the GCC?

Rami Shabaneh, Bertrand Rioux, Steve Griffiths

The last decade saw dramatic changes in the energy sector, including the shale oil and gas boom in the United States (U.S.), a commodity down-cycle, and heightened awareness of the global climate challenge. In response, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)…

Shabaneh, Rami

Rioux, Bertrand

Griffiths, Steve

Cooperate or Compete? Insights from Simulating a Global Oil Market with No Residual Supplier

Bertrand Rioux, Abdullah AlJarboua, Fatih Karanfil, Axel Pierru, Shahd Alrashed, Colin Ward

Structural changes in the global oil sector are disrupting conventional market dynamics and the roles played by competing and cooperating producers. Industry players are adjusting to the shale (or ‘tight’) oil revolution and the possibility of plateauing or peaking global…

Rioux, Bertrand

AlJarboua, Abdullah

Karanfil, Fatih

Pierru, Axel

Alrashed, Shahd

Ward, Colin

Simulating a Global Oil Market With No Residual Supplier

Bertrand Rioux, Abdullah AlJarboua, Fatih Karanfil, Axel Pierru, Shahd Alrashed, Colin Ward

Motivation and objective of the study What if OPEC decided to abandon organizing residual production collectively, transitioning the world permanently to a competitive oil market? This commentary is based on a forthcoming KAPSARC paper, “Cooperate or Compete? Insights from Simulating…

Rioux, Bertrand

AlJarboua, Abdullah

Karanfil, Fatih

Pierru, Axel

Alrashed, Shahd

Ward, Colin

Implementing Alternative Pricing Policies in Economic Equilibrium Models Using the Extended Mathematical Programming Framework

Bertrand Rioux, Abdullah AlJarboua, Frederic Murphy, Axel Pierru

Standard economic optimization models represent markets in perfect competition. They are commonly used, though they may not accurately represent real-world policies and regulations. Equilibrium models built using a mixed complementarity problem (MCP) approach are capable of simulating more flexible pricing…

Rioux, Bertrand

AlJarboua, Abdullah

Murphy, Frederic

Pierru, Axel

An Economic Analysis of China’s Domestic Crude Oil Supply Policies

Bertrand Rioux, Philipp Galkin, Kang Wu

China’s domestic oil production has lagged the rapid growth in the country’s oil consumption since 2000, leading to a large, and growing, reliance on crude imports to meet demand. Factors including China’s current market structure and regulatory environment impede further…

Rioux, Bertrand

Galkin, Philipp

Wu, Kang

The Economic Impact of Price Controls on China’s Natural Gas Supply Chain

Science Direct

Despite significant progress made by China in liberalizing its natural gas market, certain key areas such as market access and pricing mechanisms remain controlled by the government.

Axel Pierru, Kang Wu, Frederic Murphy, Philipp Galkin, Bertrand Rioux, Yan Li, Artem Malov, Felipe Feijoo

Summertime stratospheric processes at northern mid-latitudes: comparisons between MANTRA balloon measurements and the Canadian Middle Atmosphere Model

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics

Bertrand Rioux

Unintended consequences of China’s coal capacity cut policy

Energy Policy

In early 2016, China introduced additional capacity cut policies to rebalance supply in the coal market to match demand that had been reduced by slow economic growth and strict environmental regulation. Ensuing disruptions to the coal market caused these policies…

Bertrand Rioux, Philipp Galkin

The Economic Impact of Price Controls on China’s Natural Gas Supply Chain

Bertrand Rioux, Philipp Galkin, Frederic Murphy, Axel Pierru, Kang Wu

Despite significant progress made by China in liberalizing its natural gas market, certain key areas such as market access and pricing mechanisms remain heavily monopolized or controlled by the government. To assess how such distortions impact the market, we developed…

Rioux, Bertrand

Galkin, Philipp

Murphy, Frederic

Pierru, Axel

Wu, Kang

Restructuring Saudi Arabia’s Power Generation Sector: Model-Based Insights

Bertrand Rioux, Axel Pierru, Nader AlKathiri

Saudi Arabia plans to reform and privatize its power generation sector as part of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030. To provide analytical insights, we developed a model that simulates the restructuring of the electricity market, along with reforming fuel prices to…

Rioux, Bertrand

Pierru, Axel

AlKathiri, Nader

How do Price Caps in China’s Electricity Sector Impact the Economics of Coal, Power and Wind? Potential Gains from Reforms

Energy Journal

China imposes maximum prices by plant type and region on the electricity that generators sell to utilities. We show that these price caps create a need for subsidies and cross-subsidies, and affect the economics of wind power. We model the…

Bertrand Rioux, Philipp Galkin, Frederic Murphy, Axel Pierru

Efficient industrial energy use: The first step in transitioning Saudi Arabia’s energy mix

Energy Policy

In Saudi Arabia, industrial fuel prices are administered below international prices and firms make decisions based on low energy prices, increasing domestic energy demand. This analysis explores alternative policies designed to induce a transition to a more efficient energy system…

Walid Matar, Frederic Murphy, Axel Pierru, Bertrand Rioux, David Wogan

Economic impacts of debottlenecking congestion in the Chinese coal supply chain

Energy Economics

The fast pace of development in China’s coal industry created bottlenecks in its transportation infrastructure. These bottlenecks likely affected not only China’s domestic coal market, but also global coal markets. In this paper, we estimate the costs and consequences of…

Bertrand Rioux, Philipp Galkin, Frederic Murphy, Axel Pierru