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on Project, Program and Portfolio Management |
| By: | Mohamed Khalafalla; Tejal Mulay; Shonda L Bernadin |
| Abstract: | Change orders (COs) are a common occurrence in construction projects, leading to increased costs and extended durations. Design-Bid-Build (DBB) projects, favored by state transportation agencies (STAs), often experience a higher frequency of COs compared to other project delivery methods. This study aims to identify areas of improvement to reduce CO frequency in DBB projects through a quantitative analysis. Historical bidding data from the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) was utilized to evaluate five factors, contracting technique, project location, type of work, project size, and duration, on specific horizontal construction projects. Two DBB contracting techniques, Unit Price (UP) and Lump Sum (LS), were evaluated using a discrete choice model. The analysis of 581 UP and 189 LS projects revealed that project size, duration, and type of work had a statistically significant influence on the frequency of change orders at a 95% confidence level. The discrete choice model showed significant improvement in identifying the appropriate contract type for a specific project compared to traditional methods used by STAs. By evaluating the contracting technique instead of project delivery methods for horizontal construction projects, the use of DBB can be enhanced, leading to reduced change orders for STAs. |
| Date: | 2025–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2507.00281 |
| By: | Wei Ma |
| Abstract: | This paper assumes each individual in society has a random discount factor and assesses an intertemporal project using rank-dependent expected utility theory. We consider both the ex ante and the ex post approaches. For the former, we show the social planner's discount factor is a convex combination of those of the individuals under the standard Pareto condition. For the latter, we propose a method for determining the social planner's discount factor distribution from the individuals' distributions, which are possibly heterogenous. We demonstrate that relative to expected utility, overweighing of small probabilities can substantially accelerate the decline of the social discount rate. |
| Date: | 2025–08 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2508.17978 |
| By: | L. Serafini; R. Paci; E. Marrocu |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the impact of green, digital, and twin transition investments on firm performance in Italy during the 2014-2020 programming period. Drawing on detailed project-level data from the OpenCoesione platform on ERDF-funded initiatives, we classify investments according to their thematic focus and apply a staggered Difference-in-Differences approach to estimate their effects on value added, employment, and labour productivity. Our results show that firms supported through twin transition projects, those combining green and digital components, achieve the most substantial and sustained gains in value added and productivity. These integrated interventions appear particularly effective in enhancing firm performance and capacity utilisation, with employment effects emerging more gradually. Purely green and digital projects also yield positive outcomes, though with more moderate and variable effects. We further document significant heterogeneity across regions and sectors, with stronger impacts observed among firms located in Northern and Southern Italy and in knowledge-intensive sectors. Our findings highlight the importance of strategic investment design - transition-oriented and multi-dimensional projects consistently outperform single-focus initiatives. These results suggest that EU cohesion policy plays a pivotal role in supporting structural transformation, particularly when funding is targeted to integrated projects that align with broader environmental and digital policy goals. |
| Keywords: | Twin Transition;Green policies;Digital policies;Innovation and firm Performance;Cohesion Policy;Counterfactual Impact Analysis |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cns:cnscwp:202511 |
| By: | Fraas, Arthur G. (Resources for the Future); Joiner, Emily (Resources for the Future); Lee, Brielle; Liu, Krystal |
| Abstract: | The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) is often identified as a major obstacle to renewable energy projects locating on federal public lands or seeking federal funding. Once NEPA permits have been issued, a project may face additional delays if a federal agency’s decision is challenged in court. The delays associated with NEPA permitting for renewable generation projects have been explored by Fraas et al. (2023, 2025), but the effect of environmental court challenges to renewables projects has received less attention. This paper builds on Fraas et al. (2023, 2025), examining the legal challenges faced by each project and presenting the timeline in months for each case. Nearly a third of solar projects and half of wind projects completing NEPA environmental impact statement reviews faced court challenges. Almost all cases were filed after the government agencies had issued their permitting decisions. Although the courts typically ruled in the government agencies’ and project developers’ favor, the majority of cases were appealed. Court challenges in both federal and state courts caused or contributed to the termination of three projects, and six additional projects experienced significant delays as developers awaited court appeal decisions. We find that wind and solar projects that faced court challenges took an average of about 15 months longer to reach operational status than projects without court challenges. |
| Date: | 2025–08–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rff:report:rp-25-15 |
| By: | Fraas, Arthur G. (Resources for the Future); Joiner, Emily (Resources for the Future); Lee, Brielle; Liu, Krystal |
| Abstract: | Growing demand for electricity and increased interest in affordable clean energy sources have created a rich economic opportunity for renewable energy developers in recent years. However, developers have long expressed frustration with the myriad obstacles to building new generation projects—in particular, selecting a site and securing the necessary leases and federal permits. The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) establishes a process of environmental review that is compulsory for any major action, including the financing of solar and wind projects and construction of utility-scale renewable energy projects on federal lands. Utility -scale projects are projects with a capacity greater than 20 megawatts (AC), as FERC has adopted 20 megawatts as the cut-off for large merchant generators. 20 megawatt or greater capacity is considered competitive for wholesale power markets (NARUC and U.S. AID n.d.; Urban Grid 2019). Its requirements are often mentioned as a major obstacle to renewable energy development, but does the NEPA process significantly delay renewable energy projects? Would adjustments to NEPA accelerate the clean energy transition? We examine the experience for solar, wind, and geothermal power plants that completed the NEPA process from 2009 to 2023 to provide new insights into these questions. Over this period, we find that the solar and wind projects subject to NEPA review account for only a small fraction of the total utility-scale renewable capacity brought online from 2010 through 2023. These renewable projects completed the formal NEPA process in less time than the average time for all project types across all federal agencies. Almost two-thirds of these solar and wind projects did so within one to two years; however, a number of the remaining projects required substantially longer. |
| Date: | 2025–08–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rff:report:rp-25-14 |
| By: | Bergman, Aaron (Resources for the Future); Zhu, Yuqi (Resources for the Future) |
| Abstract: | Decarbonizing the global economy will require substantial investment in new industrial-scale climate technologies. A key step in this process is moving from prototype to full-scale demonstration and deployment. Through both government and private-sector investment, these technologies attempt to cross this “valley of death, ” often involving considerable expense and risk associated with building at much larger scale. A particular challenge for first-of-a-kind (FOAK) to nth-of-a-kind (NOAK) projects is technological performance risk, where a lack of existing history leads to uncertainty about whether the finished facility will operate as intended. Without a way to guarantee performance, these projects can struggle to find adequate contracted offtake and financing.One compelling solution lies with insurance, which can shift technological risk from companies or project owners to an insurer at a cost to the insured. Often, the perceived risk of an emerging technology is much higher than the actual risk, leading to a high cost of capital. By accurately assessing and then assuming this risk, insurers can play a key role in helping project developers obtain lower-cost financing. While private insurance providers have historically offered this type of technology performance insurance (TPI), it is often only sparsely available and at a significant premium. At the same time, existing government solutions, primarily in the form of loan guarantees, may be inadequate due to challenges with the application process and less willingness to take on technology risk for projects earlier in the commercialization process. These loan guarantees also do not address issues with securing offtake contracts.Historically, markets for commercial-scale clean technologies took decades to coalesce, but achieving 2050 climate goals necessitates a much faster pace of deployment. With time of the essence, governments may need to step in to help build the performance insurance market. There are several ways that the government might play a role in increasing the availability of technology performance insurance. First is through an insurance backstop, which incentivizes private insurers to provide insurance up to a certain level of losses, at which point the government steps in. The second is through a federally operated insurance program, similar to the one offered through the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Loan Guarantee Programs Office (LPO), which would draw on the full technical expertise of the government and offer an insurance policy to project developers. Finally, we also consider opportunities for DOE to facilitate greater collaboration between project developers, insurers, and policymakers.In this report, we provide background on technology performance risk, explore the pros and cons of each of these policy options, and discuss potential design and implementation questions. |
| Date: | 2025–02–20 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rff:report:rp-25-03 |
| By: | Potter, Nicholas A.; Hrozencik, R. Aaron; Wallander, Steven |
| Abstract: | This report uses data from USDA’s 2019 Survey of Irrigation Organizations to describe differences between several types of irrigation organizations with different organizational structures: U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) projects, irrigation districts, incorporated mutuals, unincorporated mutuals, and other organization types. Irrigation organizations are private, quasi-public, or public institutions formed to coordinate the construction and maintenance of water storage and delivery infrastructure or to manage groundwater extraction. Some organizations engage in both where surface and groundwater resources are available. Organizations such as unincorporated mutual organizations tend to be smaller in terms of their assets, total farm acres served, and size of farms served, and also source less water from State and Federal water projects. Conversely, irrigation districts tend to be larger, include larger farms, and more frequently have elected boards of representatives rather than direct voting on issues. |
| Keywords: | Financial Economics, Industrial Organization, Resource/Energy Economics and Policy |
| Date: | 2025–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:uerseb:369045 |