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In this paper, we investigate the promises that are employed within and around clusters that were formed in the evolving bioeconomy: bioclusters for short. Our paper aims to provide a conceptual clarification of the biocluster concept. To that effect, we employ the prism of sociotechnical imaginaries. We argue that both industrial clusters and the bioeconomy constitute separate, but partly overlapping sociotechnical imaginaries that shape stakeholder attitudes towards bioclusters. We applied a Q-methodology study in two bioeconomy clusters, one in Germany and one in The Netherlands, to investigate the resonance of different imaginaries in the cluster regions. Five distinct narratives, combining specific elements of cluster and bioeconomy imaginaries, are shared by different stakeholder groups. We revealed bioeconomy imaginaries at large to be far more contested than different cluster imaginaries. The latter mobilise overwhelmingly positive associations across diverse stakeholder groups. From this perspective, the popularity of biocluster promotional policies can be explained as they support some of the contested elements of bioeconomy imaginaries in gaining traction.

SummaryThe German government has adopted a law that requires sewage plants to go beyond the recovery of phosphorus from wastewater and to promote recycling. We argue that there is no physical global short‐ or mid‐term phosphorus scarcity. However, we also argue that there are legitimate reasons for policies such as those of Germany, including: precaution as a way to ensure future generations’ long‐term supply security, promotion of technologies for closed‐loop economics in a promising stage of technology development, and decrease in the current supply risk with a new resource pool.

Abstract Rare earth permanent magnets are important components for modern (energy) technologies and are employed to reduce GHG emissions and combat climate change. The process of extracting these minerals from the ore has contentious economic, environmental and social implications. While the environmental impacts of their production have already been analyzed in several studies, the economic and the social perspective is still under-researched. The Social Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) approach employed in the present research explores whether there is a difference in social risks for rare earth permanent magnet production from three different rare earth ore production locations and the associated value chains. While one is located completely in China, another is composed of processes in Australia and Malaysia. The third process chain combines processes in the United States and Japan. The Product Social Impact Life Cycle Assessment (PSILCA) 2.0 database is used to assess the social implications. The analysis focuses on value chain actors, a stakeholder group of great interest to businesses but often underrepresented in S-LCA research. The impact categories describing this stakeholder group pertain to issues of social responsibility along the value chain, fair competition and corruption. Overall, the US value chain indicates the lowest level of social risk along the supply chain. However, in order to gain a deeper understanding of the social risks a sectoral and geographical analysis is conducted. Across all three cases, the mineral, fossil fuel and chemical sectors are shown to be problematic.

Diese Dissertation beantwortet verschiedene politikrelevante ökonomische Fragen in den Bereichen Handelspolitik, Geldpolitik, sowie Rohstoffmärkte und Energieökonomik mit Hilfe von strukturellen Vektorautoregressionsmodellen (SVAR). SVARs stellen eine effektive Möglichkeit dar, die Beziehungen zwischen verschiedenen makroökonomischen und/oder Finanzmarkt-Variablen zu modellieren und werden verwendet, um die dynamischen kausalen Effekte von ökonomischen Schocks zu schätzen. Für jede ökonomische Fragestellung wird eine Identifikationsstrategie angewandt, die auf die betrachteten Daten und ihre statistischen Eigenschaften sowie die zugrundeliegenden Annahmen über ökonomische Mechanismen zwischen den betrachteten Zeitreihen zugeschnitten ist. Im Einzelnen besteht diese Dissertation aus vier Kapiteln. In den ersten beiden Kapiteln werden die Auswirkungen von Handelspolitik auf Finanzmärkte und auf die Makroökonomie geschätzt. Das dritte Kapitel liefert einen methodischen Beitrag zur SVAR-Literatur, der in einer Anwendung zu den Effekten von Geldpolitik dargestellt wird. Das letzte Kapitel verlässt die Felder der Handels- und Geldpolitik und wendet sich Rohstoffmärkten und der Energiewirtschaft zu, stützt sich dabei aber ebenfalls auf Zeitreihenmethoden. Es analysiert die Rolle von Metallen in der Energiewende. This dissertation answers various policy relevant economic questions in the fields of trade policy, monetary policy, and commodity markets and energy economics using structural vector autoregression (SVAR) models. SVARs constitute a parsimonious way to model the relations between different macroeconomic and/or financial variables and they are used to estimate the dynamic causal effects of economic shocks. For each economic question, this dissertation applies an identification strategy that is tailored to the relevant data and its statistical properties as well as the underlying assumptions about economic mechanisms among the regarded time series. Specifically, this dissertation consists of four chapters. The first two chapters estimate the effects of trade policy on financial markets and on the macroeconomy. The third chapter makes a methodological contribution to the SVAR literature in an application to monetary policy shocks. The final chapter moves away from trade and monetary policy to commodity markets and energy economics but also relies on time series methods. It analyzes the role of metals for the clean energy transition.

The promotion of electric vehicles (EVs) is an important measure for dealing with climate change and reducing carbon emissions, which are widely agreed goals worldwide. Being an important operating mode for electric vehicle charging stations in the future, the integrated photovoltaic and energy storage charging station (PES-CS) is receiving a fair amount of attention and discussion. However, how to optimally configure photovoltaic and energy storage capacity to achieve the best economy is essential and a huge challenge to overcome. In this paper, based on the historical data-driven search algorithm, the photovoltaic and energy storage capacity allocation method for PES-CS is proposed, which determines the capacity ratio of photovoltaic and energy storage by analyzing the actual operation data, which is performed while considering the target of maximizing economic benefits. In order to achieve the proposed capacity allocation, the method is as follows: First, the economic benefit model of the charging stations is established, taking the net present value and investment payback period as evaluation indicators; then, by analyzing the operation data of the existing charging station with the target of maximizing economic benefits, the initial configuration capacity is obtained; finally, the capacity configuration is verified through a comprehensive case analysis for the actual operation data. The results show that the capacity configuration obtained through the data analysis features an optimized economic efficiency and photovoltaic utilization. The proposed method can provide a theoretical and practical basis for newly planned or improved large-scale charging stations.

Abstract Energy efficiency improvement will reduce the effective price of energy services, and hence at least partially mitigate original expected energy conservation. Therefore, the magnitude of rebound effect is important for the design and timing of an effective energy conservation policy. Under the framework of translog cost share equations, we estimates the direct rebound effect for heavy industry in China for the first time by conducting an empirical research on the relationship between the direct rebound effect and the ease with which energy services can substitute for other inputs. Additionally, asymmetric price responses are specified in the model for the rebound effect estimation. Empirical results in our paper indicate that the rebound effect for heavy industry in China is about 74.3%. This reveals that energy efficiency improvement can save energy to a certain degree since the rebound effect is less than 100% (“back-fire”), but most of the expected reduction in heavy industry energy consumption is mitigated. These findings prove that energy pricing reforms and energy taxes should be further implemented to achieve effective energy conservation in China’s 12th Five Years Plan.

Highlights •Biomass resource constraints impact the effectiveness of bioeconomy policies. •Bioeconomy policies may have an important impact on the sector structure in the long run, but the sector growth remains ultimately constrained by the availability of inputs. •Solutions to reduce the biomass constraint have to be included in innovation policy for the biobased economy.

Background. Laws that enable a circular economy (CE) are being enacted globally, but reliable standardized and digitized CE data about products is scarce, and many CE platforms have differing exclusive formats. In response to these challenges, the Ministry of The Economy of Luxembourg launched the Circularity Dataset Standardization Initiative to develop a globalized open-source industry standard to allow the exchange of standardized data throughout the supply cycle, based on these objectives: (a) Provide basic product circularity data about products. (b) Improve circularity data sharing efficiency. (c) Encourage improved product circularity performance. A policy objective was to have the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) voted to create a working group. Methods. A state-of-play analysis was performed concurrently with consultations with industry, auditors, data experts, and data aggregation platforms. Results. Problem statements were generated. Based on those, a solution called Product Circularity Data Sheet (PCDS) was formulated. A proof of concept (POC) template and guidance were developed and piloted with manufacturers and platforms, thus fulfilling objective (a). For objective (b), IT ecosystem requirements were developed, and aspects are being piloted in third party aggregation platforms. Objective (c) awaits implementation of the IT ecosystem. The policy objective related to the ISO was met. Conclusions and future research. In order to fully test the PCDS, it is necessary to: conduct more pilots, define governance, and establish auditing and authentication procedures.