Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / During the latter half of the nineteenth and in the early twentieth century, the Indianapolis Wholesale District (IWD) operated as a local and regional commercial hub. Analysis of the IWD’s relationship with the railroad network in Indiana points to a widening of trade, yet regional focus due to transportation restrictions. The growth and subsequent specialization of wholesale trading in the district catered to primarily local and regional audiences. Examining the physical presence of the IWD in downtown Indianapolis uncovers the built environment of a midwestern business district. This research project argues for the local and regional significance of the Indianapolis Wholesale District. Additionally, this thesis demonstrates the need to pursue the overlap in specialization, the morphology of warehouses, and transportation development to understand a business district as part of a larger process of American economic development.

The goal of this study is to determine the economic implications of incorporating intermittent renewable energy into current power systems. The study also considers how to achieve an optimal mix of generating assets with renewable power, as well as the costs and advantages of using renewable energy sources to reduce CO2 emissions. Furthermore, this study examines how renewable energy exacerbates the "missing money" problem, which is a critical problem in electricity market design. The last part of this research is devoted to the calibration of the hybrid electricity grid model. We adopt positive mathematical programming (PMP) to calibrate the quadratic cost function for fossil fuel power plants. The calibrated model enables us to better analyze the impact of renewable energy on the electricity market. We find that due to the intermittency of wind and solar power, renewable energy could replace part of the peak load capacity like gas turbines but is not able to replace most of the base load capacity like coal capacities. The unintended consequences are that to eliminate the coal base load capacity, other forms of baseload capacities such as nuclear or hydropower capacity are necessary to incorporate the intermittent renewable power. Moreover, the capacity factors of remained peak load capacities and newly built base load capacities declined. Further support policies for maintaining the capacity adequacy standard are necessary for a reliable hybrid electricity market. / Graduate / 2023-09-26

Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESSs) have become an increasingly popular feature of the electrical grid in the California ISO (CAISO) as a means to address the challenges posed by renewable energy variability and escalating peak demand. Due to their ability to reduce peak load demand on traditional generators and extend the benefits of the merit order effect, they have been theorized and claimed to reduce peak electricity prices. The purpose of this study is to test these claims within CAISO and understand what effects BESSs have had on peak electricity prices. Our findings show that there has been a significant decrease in prices after the introduction of BESSs into the grid although we found no significant effects of an increasing utilization of BESSs on peak electricity prices. We conclude that BESS utilization in CAISO has had no effect on peak electricity prices. We are contributing to the literature on the tangible market impacts of BESSs, highlighting the need for further empirical research in this domain.

Thesis (MPhil)--Stellenbosch University, 2014. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: According to Van Scheers (2010, p. 1) small businesses constitute 55% of the employment rate in South Africa. The argument that in the future new jobs are more likely to come from a large number of small businesses than from a small number of large businesses (Martin, 2001, p. 189) has challenged the South African government to support the empowerment of small business. The Wholesale and Retail Sector Education and Training Authority (W&R SETA) was formed as part of the governmental plan to ensure quality-learning provision within the wholesale and retail sector. The training of employees within small businesses in the wholesale and retail sector is not adequate (Mokgata, 2009, p. 4), despite the various methods of training funded by the W&R SETA. The small business unit at the W&R SETA introduced the Voucher-training System. Small levy paying businesses in this sector receive a voucher or vouchers that can be used to access free training opportunities for staff. Providers accredited with the W&R SETA are allowed to offer training programmes that suit the education and training needs of the sector. Companies pay the provider with the free vouchers they are allocated by the SETA. The scope of the Small Business Voucher-training System is to offer short courses that provide skills with immediate effect on the small businesses. The focus of this study grew out of the need to know if the voucher-training programmes meet the needs of small businesses in the wholesale and retail sector. In order to determine whether the voucher-training programmes meet the needs of the small business sector, the small business managers’ perceptions of the voucher-training programme are essential in order to develop insights into the possible improvements and sustainability of the programme. A descriptive research study from an interpretivist perspective is used to understand the perceptions of the small business managers of the voucher programmes. A case study design was used and forms the basis of this study. Interviews were used to elicit qualitative data that provide insights into small business managers’ perceptions of the voucher-training programme. A descriptive research study from an interpretivist perspective is used to understand the perceptions of the small business managers of the voucher programmes. A case study design was used and forms the basis of this study. Interviews were used to elicit qualitative data that provide insights into small business managers’ perceptions of the voucher-training programme. The reasons small business managers gave explaining why they selected specific programmes for employees indicate the influence the training had on employees and their future progression and development within their company. It showed how the company itself benefited from the employees involvement in these programmes and lists the most appropriate programme for these small businesses in the wholesale and retail sector. The small business managers’ reflections on any changes in their employees’ behaviour after the employee attended the voucher-training programme ranged from positive behaviours which they noticed to poor or no influence from the training interventions on employee behaviours at all. The learning programmes small business managers noted as essential in furthering the development of their employees are programmes that suit the respondents in this study. These insights are important in order to understand the type of programmes needed by small business managers in determining the further training needs for their employees in the wholesale and retail sector. The respondents shared various insights, from their personal experience after they had sent employees on the learning programmes, on how they felt the voucher programme system could be improved. The insights these small business managers provide on how to possibly improve the voucher-training programme indicate a thorough knowledge of their business and operational requirements which the SETA and providers need to pay careful attention to should this programme continue.

published_or_final_version / Business Administration / Master / Master of Business Administration

本研究主要目的在於針對「促進產業升級條例」第六條項下之「批發業零售業及技術服務業購置設備或技術適用投資抵減辦法」有關投資抵減獎勵對企業經營績效進行評估。本研究就理論基礎、實際適用情形及經營績效等層面分析，作實證研究。 因「促產條例」乃台灣現階段獎勵與輔導產業的主要法源，新世代產業獎勵法規的研擬，實應周密考量國內外的產業現況及未來可能之轉型方向，配合投資環境之變革及未來產業發展之需要，以促進台灣未來產業升級轉型為創新、高附加價值之經濟體。故在產業已由工業轉型為服務業之際，政府應對服務業提供怎樣的優惠措施，現行的批發零售業投資抵減對企業實際之效益為何，擬具體研究企業經營績效與政府投資抵減優惠措施之相關性，以作為政府擬定獎勵措施或修法調整之參考。 本研究以2001年至2006年之上市櫃批發業及零售業公司為研究對象，採用追蹤型兩階段最小平方法之固定效果廻歸模型進行估計，先以兩階段最小平方法之固定效果模型計算出投資抵減估計值，再進行投資抵減對經營績效之影響評估。實證結果發現，投資抵減政策確實為提升企業經營績效之關鍵影響因素，故以租稅減免來鼓勵企業從事研發，提高產業競爭力及附加價值，是值得政府擬定政策時考量的。 / The goal of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of tax credit incentive to investments according to “Regulations Governing Application of Tax Credit Incentive to Investments in Purchasing Equipment or Technology by Wholesale, Retail Industry and Technical Service Enterprises” which is under the “Statute for Upgrading Industries”, Article 6. This study analyzes the effectiveness in aspect of theory and practice. “Statute for Upgrading Industries” is the main law to help industries to upgrade. The new generation laws and regulations should consider the domestic and foreign industrial situation, and the future reforming direction of the industry development. It is wonder to understand what should be done by government to help the service industry and what is the present benefit of tax credit to enterprises. In the time of transformation from manufacture industry to service industry, this study tries to approve the relationship between the tax credit incentive to investments and business performance, which can be adopted to be reference materials in legislation. This study uses the data of wholesale and retail companies in stock market from 2001 to 2006. The adopted models including 2SLS model and fixed-effect model. The first, using 2SLS model to calculate the estimate of tax credit incentive to investment to solve the endogenous problem. The second, it’s invested and supports and reduces investment benefits the impact of tax credit incentive to investments and business assess. According to the real example result, we can understand verifies tax credit incentive to investments is the key factor to improve the business performance . Therefore, it is worth for the government to take tax credit incentive to investments policy to encourage the enterprises to be engaged in the research and development.

Since the late 1980s, the energy sector in Great Britain has undergone some core changes in its functionality; beginning with the early 1990s privatisation, followed by an increased green ambition, and commencing a transition towards a low-carbon economy. As the British energy sector prepares itself for another major overhaul, it also puts itself at risk for not being sufficiently prepared for the consequences this transition will have on the existing generating capacity, security of supply, and the national electricity market. Upon meeting existing targets, the government of the United Kingdom risks becoming complacent, putting energy regulation to the backseat and focusing on other regulatory tasks, while introducing cuts for thriving renewable and other low-carbon energy generating technologies. The government has implemented a variety of directives, initiatives, and policies that have sometimes been criticised due to their lack of clarity and potential overlap between energy and climate change directives. The government has introduced policies that aim to provide stable short-term solutions. However, a concrete way of resolving the energy trilemma and some of the long-term objectives and more importantly ways of achieving them are yet to be developed. This work builds on analysing each low-carbon technology individually by assessing its past and current state in the British energy mix. By accounting for the changes and progress the technology underwent in its journey towards becoming a part of the energy capacity in Great Britain, its impact on the future wholesale electricity prices is studied. Research covered in this thesis presents an assessment of the existing and incoming low-carbon technologies in Great Britain and their individual and combined impact on the future of British energy economics by studying their implications for the electricity market. The methodological framework presented here uses a cost-minimisation merit order model to provide useful insights for novel methods of electricity production and conventional thermal energy generation to aid with the aftermath of potential inadequate operational and fiscal flexibility. The thesis covers a variety of scenarios differing in renewable and thermal penetration and examines the impact of interconnection, energy storage, and demand side management on the British wholesale electricity prices. The implications of increasing low-carbon capacity in the British energy mix are examined and compared to similar developments across Europe. The analysis highlights that if the optimistic scenarios in terms of green energy installation are followed, there is sufficient energy supply, which results in renewable resources helping to keep the wholesale price of electricity down. However, if the desired capacity targets are not met, the lack of available supply could result in wholesale prices going up, especially in the case of a natural gas price increase. Although initially costly, the modernisation of the British grid leads to a long-term decrease in wholesale electricity prices and provides a greater degree of security of supply and flexibility for all market participants.

<p>In most electricity markets, producers submit supply functions to a procurement uniform-price auction under uncertainty before demand has been realized. In the Supply Function Equilibrium (SFE), every producer commits to the supply function that maximises his expected profit given the bids of competitors. </p><p>The presence of multiple equilibria is a basic weakness of the SFE framework. Essay I shows that with (i) symmetric producers, (ii) perfectly inelastic demand, (iii) a reservation price (price cap), and (iv) capacity constraints that bind with a positive probability, a unique symmetric SFE exists. The equilibrium price reaches the price cap exactly when capacity constraints bind.</p><p>Another weakness is difficulty finding a valid asymmetric SFE with non-decreasing supply functions. Essay II shows that for firms with asymmetric capacity constraints but identical constant marginal costs there exists a unique and valid SFE. Equilibrium supply functions exhibit kinks as well as vertical and horizontal segments. The price at which the capacity constraint of a firm binds is increasing in the firm’s share of market capacity. The capacity constraint of the second largest firm binds when the market price reaches the price cap. Thereafter, the largest firm supplies its remaining capacity with a perfectly elastic segment at the price cap. Essay III presents a numerical algorithm that calculates a similar SFE for asymmetric firms with increasing marginal costs. </p><p>Essay IV derives the SFE of a pay-as-bid auction such as the balancing market for electric power in Britain. A unique SFE always exists if the demand’s hazard rate is monotonically decreasing, as for a Pareto distribution of the second kind. Assuming this probability distribution, the pay-as-bid procurement auction is compared to the SFE of a uniform-price procurement auction. Two theorems in Essay V prove that the demand-weighted average price is (weakly) lower in the pay-as-bid procurement auction. </p>

In most electricity markets, producers submit supply functions to a procurement uniform-price auction under uncertainty before demand has been realized. In the Supply Function Equilibrium (SFE), every producer commits to the supply function that maximises his expected profit given the bids of competitors. The presence of multiple equilibria is a basic weakness of the SFE framework. Essay I shows that with (i) symmetric producers, (ii) perfectly inelastic demand, (iii) a reservation price (price cap), and (iv) capacity constraints that bind with a positive probability, a unique symmetric SFE exists. The equilibrium price reaches the price cap exactly when capacity constraints bind. Another weakness is difficulty finding a valid asymmetric SFE with non-decreasing supply functions. Essay II shows that for firms with asymmetric capacity constraints but identical constant marginal costs there exists a unique and valid SFE. Equilibrium supply functions exhibit kinks as well as vertical and horizontal segments. The price at which the capacity constraint of a firm binds is increasing in the firm’s share of market capacity. The capacity constraint of the second largest firm binds when the market price reaches the price cap. Thereafter, the largest firm supplies its remaining capacity with a perfectly elastic segment at the price cap. Essay III presents a numerical algorithm that calculates a similar SFE for asymmetric firms with increasing marginal costs. Essay IV derives the SFE of a pay-as-bid auction such as the balancing market for electric power in Britain. A unique SFE always exists if the demand’s hazard rate is monotonically decreasing, as for a Pareto distribution of the second kind. Assuming this probability distribution, the pay-as-bid procurement auction is compared to the SFE of a uniform-price procurement auction. Two theorems in Essay V prove that the demand-weighted average price is (weakly) lower in the pay-as-bid procurement auction.

This thesis comprises three papers examining the impact of competitive pricing or competition on participants in energy markets. The scope of each paper is narrow but focused, dealing with one particular aspect of competition in each market under study. It is hoped that results from these three studies could provide valuable policy lessons to public policy makers in their task to create or maintain competition in different energy markets, so as to improve efficiencies in these markets. The first and second papers examine the load shifting behavior of industrial customers in Ontario under real time pricing (RTP). Using Hourly Ontario Energy Price (HOEP) data from 2005 to 2008 and industry-level consumption data from all industrial customers directly connected to the transmission grid, the first paper adopts a Generalized Leontief specification to obtain elasticities of substitution estimates for various industry groups, while the second paper adopts a specification derived from standard consumer theory to obtain price elasticity estimates. The findings of both papers confirm that in some industries, industrial customers who are direct participants of the wholesale market tend to shift consumption from peak to off-peak periods in order to take advantage of lower off-peak prices. Furthermore, in the first paper, a demand model is estimated and there is evidence that the marginal effect of hourly load on hourly price during peak periods is larger than the marginal effect during off-peak periods. An important policy implication from the results of these papers is that while RTP is currently limited to industrial customers, it does have positive spillover effects on all consumers. The third paper uses a unique panel dataset of all retail gasoline stations across five Canadian cities from late-2006 to mid-2007 to examine the effect of local competition on market shares and sales of individual stations. The base empirical specification includes explanatory variables representing the number of same brand stations and the number of different brand stations within a 3km radius to identify brand affiliation effect. It is found that the number of local competitors is negatively correlated with market share and sales. More interestingly, a same brand competitor has a larger marginal impact on market share and sales than a competitor of a different brand. These findings suggest that additional local competition leads to cannibalization of market share among existing stations, rather than create new demand. Another implication is that relying only on the number of different brands operating within a geographic market could understate the competition intensity in the local market.