UC3M wins prestigious ERC Advanced Grant
2.5 million euros for an innovative research project on energy transition policies
8/2/24
Natalia Fabra, full professor in the Department of Economics at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M), has received two and a half million euros after obtaining an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council (ERC). This prestigious grant is intended for leading researchers in their field, with an outstanding track record in terms of the originality and significance of their scientific contributions.
The highly competitive ERC Advanced Grant program is designed to provide top researchers at European universities and research centers with the opportunity to carry out ambitious projects with the potential to generate major scientific breakthroughs.
The research project led by Natalia Fabra, entitled "Socio-Economic Challenges and Opportunities of the Energy Transition: ENERGY-IN-TRANSITION", will be carried out over the next five years. Its main objective is to expand the frontiers of knowledge in the field of energy and environmental economics, addressing the new socio-economic challenges and opportunities that arise with the Energy Transition.
Its objectives include analyzing the design of electricity markets with a high penetration of renewable energies and pioneering research on the new regulation of green hydrogen. It will also delve into the distributional repercussions of climate and energy policies, providing solutions to avoid potentially regressive effects. Special attention will be paid to quantifying the socio-economic effects on the territory, such as the impacts on the labor market and demographics due to the closure of thermal power plants and the deployment of renewable energy investments. In addition, it will identify the causes of local opposition to new renewable plants and propose measures to increase their social acceptance. Finally, it will analyze the impact of the recent energy crisis on the adoption of solar self-consumption in households, and investigate the distributional implications of different options to promote it. As a result, the project will provide relevant conclusions for the implementation of climate and energy policies aimed at enhancing the efficiency and equity of the Energy Transition.
Methodologically, the project will use a combination of theoretical models, econometric techniques, simulation tools and surveys. It will develop new models on long-term contracting in the electricity market, apply advanced Machine Learning methods to create counterfactual scenarios for policy analysis, and design simulation tools to evaluate the interaction between various regulatory measures.
UC3M is one of the Spanish universities with the highest number of ERC grants, a commitment to the internationalization of EU research. Specifically, the University has already obtained 12 ERC projects (8 Starting Grants, 6 Consolidator Grants, 2 Proof of Concept and 1 Advanced Grant) with an overall funding of almost 27 million euros. More information: https://www.uc3m.es/investigacion/ERC
