Jun 2019 – , Academic papers

Multiple benefits of energy efficiency at the firm level: a literature review

Authors:

Gavin Killup, University of Oxford
Tina Fawcett, University of Oxford
Catherine Cooremans, University of Lausanne
Wina Crijns-Graus, Utrecht University
Subramani Krishnan, Utrecht University
Fabian Voswinkel, Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research

The multiple benefits of energy efficiency for individual businesses have not received sufficient research attention. For firms, these non-energy benefits may be critically important to their investment decisions. This paper presents initial results from a project investigating the firm-level strategic benefits of energy efficiency. Using a rapid evidence assessment method, the literature on multiple benefits in firm-level energy efficiency decisions was reviewed. This encompassed academic, conference and grey literature, with thousands of items scanned, leading to 30 documents being read in detail. This process confirmed that relatively little has been published on the topic. Nevertheless, there is evidence that strategic non-energy benefits do exist, e.g. reduced production down-time, increased product quality or improved productivity. These benefits can positively and significantly influence the financial assessment of energy efficiency projects. However, such benefits are generally not reported, quantified or included in project assessment.

Originally published in the 2019 eceee Summer Study proceedings paper #2-159-19.