The impact of climate change on the electricity market: A review

Climate change will impact electricity markets through both electricity demand and supply. This paper reviews the research on this topic. Whereas there is much that remains unknown or uncertain, research over the last few years has significantly advanced our knowledge. In general, higher temperatures are expected to raise electricity demand for cooling, decrease demand for heating, and to reduce electricity production from thermal power plants. The effect of climate change on the supply of electricity from non-thermal sources shows great geographical variability due to differences in expected changes to temperature and precipitation. Whereas the research frontier has advanced significantly in the last few years, there still remains a significant need for more research in order to better understand the effects of climate change on the electricity market. Four significant gaps in the current research are regional studies of demand side impacts for Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and Latin America, the effects of extreme weather events on electricity generation, transmission and demand, changes to the adoption rate of air conditioning, and finally, our understanding of the sensitivity of thermal power supply to changes in air and water temperatures. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.