News

NEW STUDIES: Photovoltaic generation, energy system transitions, and more

Sustainable Healthy Cities Network researchers published new papers about photovoltaic generation, energy system transitions, and more.

Kangkang Tong and Anu Ramaswami applied a multi-level perspective and co-evolutionary framework to investigate environmentally sustainable transitions in US district energy systems, including context and niche-level practices from operators’ and designers’ perspectives. Read the full article, “Environmentally sustainable transitions of US district energy systems: Perspectives from infrastructure operators/designers through the Co-evolutionary lens,” in the Journal of Cleaner Production.

Cali Curley, Richard Feiock, and Kewei Yu investigated how the design of different policy instruments with the same goal shapes the constituencies of residents participating in the program. Read the full article, “Policy analysis of instrument design: How policy design affects policy constituency,” in the Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice.

Joshua P. Newell and Anu Ramaswami wrote an editorial introducing a special issue of Environmental Research Letters, “Focus on Urban Food–Energy–Water Systems: Interdisciplinary, Multi-Scalar and Cross-Sectoral Perspectives.” The issue consists of nine articles, each of which presents emerging research on interconnected FEW systems as they relate to cities and regions. The papers are interdisciplinary, multiscalar, and cross-sectoral as they consider the effects of FEW interactions on the health of cities, their inhabitants, and the distant peoples and pldaces from which they source their resources. Read the full editorial and the special issue.

Wendell Stainsby, Daniel Zimmerle, and Gerald P. Duggan presented a methodology for modeling individual array and system-wide photovoltaic (PV) generation using only weather data, premise AMI data, and the approximate date of PV installation – information available to most distribution utilities. Read the full article, “A method to estimate residential PV generation from net-metered load data and system install date,” in Applied Energy.

Serena Kim combined a unique dataset of 488 public airports, along with interviews with managers and stakeholders at four airports, to  investigate how airports’ institutional arrangements shape their solar photovoltaic (PV) deployment decisions. Read the full article, “Institutional arrangements and airport solar PV,” in Energy Policy.