• Energy Research
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Abstract Numerous countries have set up strategic petroleum reserves (SPRs) in response to oil disruptions since 1970. While numerous studies model such programs, we found few that evaluate SPRs' historical performance. Thus, we evaluate the U.S. SPR's performance by comparing actual real costs with estimated real benefits. From 1976 to 2014, the real U.S. SPR cost was about $219 billion real (2014$) dollars, whereas the real benefit was only $122 billion. Sensitivity testing suggests such negative net benefits are qualitatively robust. However, if world oil demand is extremely inelastic to oil price or GDP is elastic enough to oil price shocks, the estimated U.S. SPR net benefit is positive. Sensitivity testing around total real costs and benefits range from $380 billion to $80 billion. Limited testing of IEA coordinated drawdowns suggests that total U.S. benefits jump from $122 billion to more than $400 billion putting the SPR strongly in the black. Limited testing of private sector inventory changes was more disappointing and tentatively suggests private activities may at times have offset some of the government drawdowns. With 20-20 hindsight, initial experimentation found that better management could have significantly enhanced the value of the U.S. SPR, especially for the 1990-91 disruption.

Achieving economic development is one of the most important economic goals of every country. Identifying the determinants of economic growth, is a useful tool for adopting appropriate economic policies. This study, therefore, empirically examines the impact of trade openness, foreign direct investment, and financial development on economic growth, across 62 countries over the period 1995–2016. These countries are divided into two groups: low-income and high-income countries. We employ the pooled mean group (PMG), mean group (MG), and dynamic fixed effect (DFE) estimation techniques on the cross-country panel data. The findings show a positive long run association between trade openness, foreign direct investment (FDI), financial development, labor, government expenditure, and economic growth in low-income countries, with a positive and negative short run effect from capital and government expenditures, respectively. For high-income countries, a positive long run association between trade openness, FDI, capital, and economic growth exist. The short run estimates indicate a positive effect on trade openness and capital as well as a negative effect on government expenditure. Our study shows that the adoption of policies that improves access to skilled labor and international trade, affect the attainment of a sustainable economic development.

The prevailing need for a more sustainable management of natural resources depends not only on the decisions made by governments and the will of the population, but also on the knowledge of the role of energy in our society and the relevance of preserving natural resources. In this sense, critical work is being done to instill key concepts—such as the circular economy and sustainable energy—in higher education institutions. In this way, it is expected that future professionals and managers will be aware of the importance of energy optimization, and will learn a series of computational methods that can support the decision-making process. In the context of higher education, this paper reviews the main trends and challenges related to the concepts of circular economy and sustainable energy. Besides, we analyze the role of simulation and serious games as a learning tool for the aforementioned concepts. Finally, the paper provides insights and discusses open research opportunities regarding the use of these computational tools to incorporate circular economy concepts in higher education degrees. Our findings show that, while efforts are being made to include these concepts in current programs, there is still much work to be done, especially from the point of view of university management. In addition, the analysis of the teaching methodologies analyzed shows that, although their implementation has been successful in favoring the active learning of students, their use (especially that of serious games) is not yet widespread.

Abstract This paper studies the impact of oil price changes on economic growth in Saudi Arabia to measure its dependency on the crude oil sector. To this end, an On/Off threshold regression is specified to allow the oil/GDP relationship to be asymmetric, nonlinear, and time-varying with regard to the business cycle phases. Further, we empirically test the diversification hypothesis put forward by the National Transformation Program (Saudi Vision 2030) to check whether the equity-energy investment initiative could boost economic growth in Saudi Arabia. First, our findings confirm the contribution of the oil sector to economic growth in the country, but also show that the oil/Saudi economy relationship exhibits nonlinearity and threshold effects, as the impact of oil price varies per regime depending on the state of the market. Second, in line with the Vision 2030 expectations, we are in favor of transforming the economy and opening its equity market. We also quantify a positive and significant impact of equity investment on the Saudi Arabian economy. Further, this diversification route will stimulate a beneficial oil effect on the real economy.

Abstract This article analyzes the CFTC's Disaggregated Commitments of Traders (DCOT) Report to get more insights into the behavior of different traders during the 2008 oil bubble. The analysis shows that: (1) the Money Manager category perfectly played the oil bubble, got in early and started selling shortly before the bubble peak; (2) the Producer/Merchant/Processor/User category and the Nonreportable category were covering their short positions into the peak of the bubble; (3) the Swap/Dealer category benefited while the price of oil was rising, but incurred heavy losses as the price of oil collapsed; (4) we find no indications of speculation by any group of traders via the positive feedback trading or rational destabilization; and (5) we do, however, criticize the commercial hedgers for failing to arbitrage the soaring oil prices in 2008.

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.

Eco-innovation has gained considerable attention in the academic and corporate world due to its potential in mitigating a firm’s sustainability issues. Most previous studies focused on the reactive approaches of eco-innovation using primary data. This study mitigates the existing research gap by highlighting proactive eco-innovation and using a secondary panel dataset. The prime objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between proactive eco-innovation and firms’ financial performance. Hence, the study will introduce the proactive eco-innovation index with the help of secondary panel data. In addition to that, the paper will also explore how proactive eco-innovation relates to circular economy. The theory of Resource-Based View (RBV) was used to explain the relationship among the variables. This study was conducted on 31 Malaysian public listed energy companies from 2015 to 2019. A proactive eco-innovation index was inferred by adapting three dimensions of eco-innovation (product, process, and technology) which is applicable for the energy sector. By applying random-effects GLS regression equation modeling, it was found that proactive eco-innovation (product eco-innovation, process eco-innovation, and technology eco-innovation) has a direct effect on firm financial performance. Furthermore, product and process eco-innovation is directly related to a circular economy through a sustainable product development process. The findings suggest that policymakers in the firm should proactively adopt eco-innovative practices. It will positively affect the circular economy as it will be cost-effective and help to reduce potential industrial pollution in the environment.

This study investigates how the structural mix of USA regional economies affects their volatility of economic growth. Four exogenous sectors are chosen for this investigation: Federal Government, construction, manufacturing, and tourism. Perhaps unsurprisingly, evidence suggests that a larger share of Federal Government employment in an economy reduces the variability of overall employment growth, while a larger share of construction activity elevates it. More telling is a finding that, recently, manufacturing has not contributed as much to such variability, and that a larger tourism presence increases it. The increasing integration of technology in tourism offers significant opportunities for a network approach and innovation in regional development.