Indian Journal of Science and Technology

Abstract

Background/Objectives: Korea has uniform incentive policies to promote renewable energy development, but these are applied by each local government in different ways. This study addresses which factors make the difference of implementation strength of the incentive policies to promote new/renewable energy development and use. Methods/Statistical Analysis: A survey was conducted with the directors of the new/renewable energy departments of all 227 local governments in Korea. The response rate was 72.7 %, and 92 local governments were employed for the analysis due to missing results. Statistical analysis was executed by the Ordered Logit Model. We diagnosed parallel regression assumptions and cut-off points, and the results showed validity of this method (financial incentives: chi2(32)=37.84 (prob>chi2=0.2199); nonfinancial incentives: chi2(32)=43.31 (prob>chi2=0.0876); cut-off points (prob>chi2=0.000)). Findings: This study shows that interest groups’ influence and new/renewable energy department level of local governments substantially promote both financial and non-financial incentive offer for new/renewable energy. In addition, whereas assemblies’ influence is likely to reduce financial incentive offer, local governments with policies to reduce environmental pollution tend to increase the financial incentive offer. Local governments implementing environmental regulations more stringently and requiring stronger administrative manpower are likely to reduce non-financial incentive offer for new/renewable energy. These finding shows that local governments applying centralized incentive policies are substantially influenced by several critical factors, such as interest groups’ influence and the new/renewable energy department level of local governments, and these factors cause variations in implementing the incentive policies of local governments. Improvements/Applications: These findings can provide significant information and rationale to enhance the effectiveness of new/renewable energy policies, to manage them, and indeed to promote new/renewable energy development and use.
Keywords: Interest Groups’ Influence, New/Renewable Energy, Renewable Energy Department Level, Uniform Incentive Policies, Varied Incentive Offer