13. Which aspects may prevent the development of energy service companies? The impact of barriers and country-specific conditions in different regions

RECALDE, MARINA YESICA

Energy Services Fundamentals and Financing 1st Edition

ELSEVIER

Año: 2021; p. 293 - 315

In the last decades energy efficiency has become the most way to achieve Energy Transition and most promising, fastest, cheapest and safest means to mitigate climate change with significant co-benefits. Nevertheless, the experience shows that, despite being cost-effective, many energy efficiency actions are often not implemented by consumers or businesses and, therefore, an energy efficiency policy is needed. There are, at least four elements that constitute the base for the energy efficiency policy: the (international and national) border conditions that set the framework of the policy and are out of the scope of the policymaker; the enabling conditions, aspects that should be addressed firstly (necessary conditions to implement de policy); the barriers, problems that prevent the implementation of the strategies and must be removed; and the last element, the instruments. Energy Services Companies (ESCOs) may appear as effective instruments to overcome some energy efficiency barriers in different sectors. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), ESCOs market has been increasing in the last years. Nevertheless, the implementation of ESCOs still faces different problems and barriers in many regions of the world. If ESCOs are to become an important policy instrument to contribute to closing the energy efficiency gap, it will be important to design a strategy to overcome their barriers. This chapter intends to contribute to the literature on ESCOs by identifying the border conditions and barriers that have affected the deployment of ESCOs around the world, and the alternative ways to remove these barriers.