5. Conclusions
This research demonstrates the results of market penetration modeling of high energy efficient appliances in Alberta's residential sector for the years 2012e2050. The models were implemented in an observational combined method based on considerations of energy system parameters, econometric diffusion models, and market share functions.
Despite the fact that the price of electricity is not high in Alberta, an increase in average electricity price could improve the market penetration of high efficiency appliances in the residential sector. However, in Alberta, government incentives to encourage people to buy higher energy efficient technologies are more effective than electricity pricing policies. The effects of technology improvement on energy efficiency are greater for almost all appliances in the first years of the study period. Clothes dryers and refrigerators have a higher potential for improving household sector energy efficiency and can achieve up to 67.5% and 64.2% greater efficiency by 2050 than their average efficiencies in 2012. A comparison of our investigation with earlier studies shows that using electricity and appliance prices in modeling helps achieve results that are more reliable. Using prices in our research helped achieve higher level of accuracy in modeling e up to 93% in our developed model for clothes washers. Finally, this study developed an approach to model the market penetration of high efficient appliances and the impacts of changes of macroeconomic parameters, appliance price, electricity price, and incentives on average energy efficiency improvement for major residential sector appliances the in other provinces or countries.
