The study examines different variations of market openings. Besides a fully opened market, it also analyses variations with a gradual opening over a period of time or with a differentiation of the opening in regard to customer attributes e.g. the exclusion of market access for households. Furthermore, the issue is being discussed, whether a basic gas supply is necessary at all. The study also evaluates the impacts of a market opening in relation to the economy, the society and the environment. The analyses carried out show that with a continuation of the opening of the gas market, there are positive effects on the economy and the private households to be expected. Moreover, the greatest potentials for efficiency gains can be achieved by a complete opening of the market.

Are Swiss energy suppliers fit for the energy future? Answers to this question provides the benchmarking of energy suppliers which INFRAS and Brandes Energie have carried out for the second time on behalf of the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (BFE). On the basis of practice-related criteria from seven fields of action, the benchmarking compares the different contributions of the energy providers regarding more energy sufficiency and renewable energies.

The results show developments towards an energy turnaround. However, they also indicate that there is still potential for improvement and further action: On average, the participants reach 49% of the goals defined in the benchmarking. As already in the first benchmarking, the differences between the particular energy providers vary to a great extent.

62 companies have voluntarily participated in the second benchmarking – altogether they cover 58% of the Swiss sales volume.

The research project «M_Key» was started in October 2014 as part of the Swiss National Research Programme «NRP71 Managing Energy Consumption» and is planned to be terminated in autumn 2017. Partners of INFRAS are the University of Neuchatel and Impact Energy Inc. The overarching objective is to gain a better understanding of the determinants of energy-efficiency investments in Swiss companies. The project targets large energy consumer firms in Switzerland in the industrial and services sectors and aims at testing the main hypothesis that energy management significantly raises companies' assessment of the strategic character of energy-efficiency investments. Core elements to answer the research questions are a large national survey, face-to-face interviews and a small number of case studies among/with Swiss large-scale energy consumers.

The energy policy of the Swiss Federal Council intends to strengthen renewable energies and energy efficiency with energy suppliers in order to guide the demand in this direction. For this purpose, INFRAS and the Association for Environmentally Sound Energy (VUE) have developed a benchmarking on behalf of the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (BFE). The benchmarking examines the efforts of the energy suppliers in the areas energy efficiency and renewable energies on the basis of practice-related criteria from seven fields of action (strategy, production, service/products). The results show considerable differences between the energy suppliers, there are, however, signs visible for the energy turnaround. There are noticeable efforts in the right direction by the energy suppliers in all the action fields, in particular in the field of the energy services. However, in principle, there is still a potential for improvement, especially concerning the rehabilitation of hydropower plants and concerning the supply mixture.