High oil prices and growing worries about climate change have heightened interest in alternative and renewable energy sources, but these frequently cost more than fossil fuels. RAND has explored the feasibility of using renewable resources such as wind power and ethanol to reduce CO2 emissions and enhance energy security, and analyzed the likely effects of such technologies on consumer energy costs.
Research conducted within RAND Environment, Energy, and Economic Development focuses on environmental quality and regulation; energy resources and systems; water resources and systems; climate, natural hazards, and disasters; and innovation, entrepreneurship, and economic development.
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Presents results of research in five related areas of electricity demand analysis under alternative rate forms.
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The Department of Energy was interested in learning more about which kinds of energy conservation services are of greater use to homeowners and in assessing the potential impact of integrated retrofit delivery systems in accelerating household retrof...
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Provides an overview of issues expected to be discussed at the United Nations Conference on New and Renewable Sources of Energy to be held in Nairobi in August 1981. The main questions the author looks at are whether the developing nations of the As...
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Examines the relative costs of four possible means of producing electrical energy-- (LWR), (LMFBR), the fusion hybrid reactor, and the accelerator-driven reactor coupled with thermal converter reactors.
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Current regulation of wholesale and retail natural gas encourages overconsumption of gas and discourages desirable entry of solar heaters, heat pumps, and other "new" residential and commercial energy technologies.
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Describes the problems in combining databases and documents the data involved in empirical testing of electricity demand model in R-1899.
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Very large airplanes using alternative fuels are examined in the context of existing and possible future U.S. Air Force missions.
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Examines the most promising energy alternatives to crude oil and the most attractive aviation fuels derivable from resource alternatives, with emphasis on coal-based aviation fuels.
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An abridgment of results of a study on energy policy issues facing California, reported in full in Energy Alternatives for California: Paths to the Future, R-1793.
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Examines short- and long-term measures to reduce the consumption of petroleum jet fuels by the U.S. Air Force.
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Very large airplanes using alternative fuels are examined in the context of existing and possible future U.S. Air Force missions.
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Very large airplanes using alternative fuels are examined in the context of existing and possible future U.S. Air Force missions. Synthetic jet fuel, liquid methane, liquid hydrogen, and nuclear propulsion are the fuel alternatives selected for detailed analysis. Conceptual designs of airplanes using each of these fuels were developed, and estimates were made of their life-cycle cost and life-cycle energy consumption.
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A model of demand for alternative forms of energy is developed which separately identifies short- and long-run adjustments in response to changes in energy prices and other factors related to energy demand.
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Addresses the uncertain potential of solar energy and the question of a transferable property interest in sunlight. Such a property right by landowners, even though transferable, would be likely to facilitate solar heating and cooling systems in Cal...
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Estimates consumption of all forms of energy in the residential sector, broken down by the major end uses, for each of the nine census regions of the United States for the base year 1970.
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Results of a major RAND study to identify and analyze energy policy issues facing California, with emphasis on developing a coordinated state policy response.
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A USAF Energy Consumption Projection Model.
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Sought to devise analytical tools to evaluate the effects on private transportation of national energy conservation measures, to apply these tools in a systematic analysis to compare the effectiveness of several alternative policy instrument...
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Examines the three greatest sources of growth — heating, cooling, and lighting — in terms of four major growth-slowing measures: improved building insulation; substitution of gas for electricity in selected end uses; use of solar energy...
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An investigation of the technical and economic aspects of tapping solar energy stored in plants and organic wastes to provide an alternative to the dwindling resources of fossil fuels. The amounts of energy that might be derived from conventional cr...
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