Publications

Behavioral Analysis on Developing a GCC Power Market

Nourah Al Hosain

In 2011, the Gulf Cooperation Council Interconnection Authority (GCCIA) completed the construction of a regional power grid connecting the Gulf states. Its main purpose was to provide backup in case of power emergencies. The grid also increases the likelihood of…

Al Hosain, Nourah

KAPSARC’s Contribution to Evaluating the Impact of Price Controls

Axel Pierru, Walid Matar

The European Journal of Operational Research has just published a paper, “Measuring the effects of price controls using mixed complementarity models” (2019). It detailed a series of innovative modeling approaches developed by KAPSARC researchers over the last six years. The…

Pierru, Axel

Matar, Walid

Oman Electricity Sector: Features, Challenges and Opportunities for Market Integration

Shahid Hasan, Turki Alaqeel, Yagyavalk Bhatt, Abdullah Al-Badi, Mohammed Al-Badi

This discussion paper is part of a KAPSARC research project initiated to develop insights that can facilitate the creation of a well-functioning integrated electricity market comprising the member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The project identifies and examines…

Hasan, Shahid

Alaqeel, Turki

Bhatt, Yagyavalk

Abdullah Al-Badi

Mohammed Al-Badi

Energy Governance in China: The Structures and Processes of Government Decision-Making

Dongmei Chen, Paul Mollet, Brian Efird

This paper describes the current governance structure of China’s energy sector. The interplay between central government, the Communist Party, regional governments and key economic actors within the framework of China’s five-year planning processes are complex and constantly evolving. As such,…

Chen, Dongmei

Mollet, Paul

Efird, Brian

Deepening Cooperation Between Saudi Arabia and China

Dongmei Chen, Wenke Han

In recent decades China and Saudi Arabia have gradually deepened their collaboration in many areas. Five indicators are used to assess the overall progress of the two countries’ collaboration and to help form recommendations for ways to improve the integration between…

Chen, Dongmei

Wenke Han

Abu Dhabi Electricity Sector – Features, Challenges and Opportunities for Market Integration

Shahid Hasan, Turki Alaqeel, Iqbal Adjali, Yagyavalk Bhatt

The emirate of Abu Dhabi was the first in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) to design and implement reforms aimed at moving away from a wholly government-owned vertically-integrated electricity market structure. From 1998, Abu Dhabi introduced several policy, legislative, structural…

Hasan, Shahid

Alaqeel, Turki

Adjali, Iqbal

Bhatt, Yagyavalk

Households’ Demand Response to Changes in Electricity Prices: A Microeconomic-Physical Approach

Walid Matar

Energy economists are interested in how a change in electricity prices prompts a response by way of end-user power demand. It is difficult to estimate price elasticities statistically if historical prices are low and change infrequently, especially in the short…

Matar, Walid

Data Insight: Electricity Tariff Changes in Saudi Arabia

Abeer AlGhamdi

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s households account for around 50% of national power consumption, with more than 7 million residential customers in 2017. The majority of this power is used for air conditioning and cooling systems due to the climate…

AlGhamdi, Abeer

KAPSARC Quarterly Issue 8

The research summaries in this issue are grouped into four themes: climate change; oil and gas; electricity; and Asia. Opening with an overview of KAPSARC’s most recent work on climate change, we also highlight our latest research on global oil…

China’s Policy Drivers of Future Energy Demand

The recent slowdown in China’s energy demand, primarily driven by decelerating economic growth and structural changes to its economy, has opened a window of opportunity for reforms aiming to establish a more sustainable energy sector and to increase the role…

The Economics of Renewable Energy in the Gulf

Hisham Akhonbay, Imtenan Al-Mubarak, Sylvain Côté, Amro Elshurafa, Walid Matar, Shreekar Pradhan, David Wogan, Lama Yaseen

The Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC) has been at the epicenter of global energy markets because of its substantial endowment of hydrocarbons. Yet countries in the region have also stated their intent to be global…

Akhonbay, Hisham

Al-Mubarak, Imtenan

Côté, Sylvain

Elshurafa, Amro

Matar, Walid

Pradhan, Shreekar

Wogan, David

Yaseen, Lama

Assessment of the Political Feasibility of Developing a GCC Power Market

Paul Mollet, Imtenan Al-Mubarak, Brian Efird, Saleh Al Muhanna, Omar Al-Ubayli

Countries in the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf, commonly known as the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), established a regional power grid to support member countries’ high voltage networks in 2001 but, to date, the system has remained underutilized.…

Mollet, Paul

Al-Mubarak, Imtenan

Efird, Brian

Al Muhanna, Saleh

Al-Ubayli, Omar

Electricity Market Integration in the GCC and MENA: Imperatives and Challenges

Rising electricity demand and growing fiscal constraints have encouraged governments in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and Middle East and North Africa (MENA) regions to consider more cooperative approaches to delivering reliable and affordable electricity services. The development of an…

The Costs and Gains of Coordinating Electricity Generation in the Gulf Cooperation Council Utilizing the Interconnector

David Wogan, Frederic Murphy, Axel Pierru

Countries in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have installed a network of high-voltage transmission lines, known as the GCC Interconnector, which links the member states of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The Interconnector…

Wogan, David

Murphy, Frederic

Pierru, Axel

Potential Effects of Trade Liberalization on China’s Imports of Plastics From the GCC

Philipp Galkin, Carlo Andrea Bollino, Rami Shabaneh

Petrochemical products, particularly plastics, contribute to a significant share of expanding and increasingly diverse trade flows between the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries and China. The petrochemical sector could benefit from a preferential bilateral trade regime between China and the…

Galkin, Philipp

Bollino, Carlo Andrea

Shabaneh, Rami

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

The Effect of Preferential Trade Agreements on Energy Trade from Chinese and Exporters’ Perspectives

Philipp Galkin, Carlo Andrea Bollino

During periods of supply abundance that lead to lower prices, commodity exporters strive to secure their market share with major importing economies. This paper seeks to cast light on what drives an exporter’s share of Chinese imports of oil, gas…

Galkin, Philipp

Bollino, Carlo Andrea

Coal and Renewables in India: Complementarity, Competition and Challenges

Coal and renewables are seen as the cornerstone of India’s energy strategy to meet its growing electricity demand. These two energy resources are at different stages of legislative, policy, regulatory and institutional reform.

Energy Relations and Policy Making in Asia

Ziyad Alfawzan, Sadeem Alhosain, Nader AlKathiri, Shahad Alarenan, Brian Efird

Trade between the economies of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and North East Asia (NEA) reached $471 billion in 2013, based almost entirely on oil and gas. The GCC sends 44 percent of its exports to NEA, which depends on…

Alfawzan, Ziyad

Alhosain, Sadeem

AlKathiri, Nader

Alarenan, Shahad

Efird, Brian

Step by Step: The Reform of China’s Energy Economy

China has become a regional powerhouse, a middle-income country and home to the world’s largest middle class. Its GDP has grown from $400 billion in 1971 to more than $13 trillion in 2012 (purchasing power parity, 2005 US$). The government…