Energy Strategy Reviews 1 (2012) 1e2

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Energy Strategy Reviews

journal homepage: www.ees.elsevier.com/esr

EDITORIAL

Energy Strategy Reviews: Perspective and Ambition

This maiden issue contains peer-reviewed articles on energy strategy, planning, decision making, modeling and analysis related to
societys energy needs. The lead article, authored by a representative team of experts on the Editorial Board, reviews the models
and actors relevant for the future optimization of Energy Mix solutions. The challenge is to improve, not only the energy system models,
but also the alignment of leading decision-makers who must use these models to effectuate optimum strategy choices for our future
energy systems. Our journals vision is that the sharing of energy visions and strategy plans by organizations, corporations and states
will contribute to establish a common knowledge base for optimizing our future energy choices. Optimists bet on Human ingenuity
to spring the Malthusian trap, as it has done so before - the Economist. Energy Strategy Reviews captures and disseminates that
ingenuity.

Getting started

Aims and Scope

Starting a new journal is not something

that can be realized overnight. Energy
Strategy Reviews (ESR) has been developed
in close consultation with experts in the field
and Elsevier. A couple of important go/no-go
dates have been successfully passed in the
course of 2010. The detailed arrangements
with Elsevier were completed in June 2011.
The Aims and Scope of the journal were finalized in July 2011, and we went online in
August 2011. The Elsevier Editorial System
was uploaded with the appropriate classification categories so editors and authors could
find matching experts.
In September 2011, the first official journal
announcement went out in an e-mailing
campaign to nearly 50,000 people. Within 24
hours, nearly 10,000 people had opened their
mail, and 1,500 had visited the web pages of
Energy Strategy Reviews. We immediately
received enthusiastic responses, and a dozen
manuscripts were uploaded by authors from
around the globe in the journal management
system. Most were judged outside the Aims
and Scope of the journal, but some of these
papers may eventually make into print.

Energy Strategy Reviews provides a single

platform for publishing authoritative content
on strategic decision-making and visionsharing related to societys energy needs.
The journal stimulates the exchange and
sharing of knowledge and best practice in
energy strategy, planning and implementation. Practitioner analyses and scholarly articles are peer-reviewed. Analytical reviews of
energy strategies, aimed at revealing what
underpins successful and less successful strategies, are welcome.
Energy Strategy Reviews will also highlight
major energy initiatives in executive summary
style, with reference to relevant support material. The sharing of energy visions and strategy
plans by organizations, corporations and states
will contribute to establish a common knowledge base for optimizing future energy choices.

I think this is a timely journal, and wish it

great success e Prof. T. Nejat Veziroglu,
Founding Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Hydrogen Energy published by Elsevier on behalf of the IAHE.
This new journal is very much needed e
Prof. Ignacio Perez-Arriaga, Director of
the BP Chair on Energy and Sustainability,
Comillas University, Madrid.

Sections featured

visions and strategies by international

agencies, governments, corporations and
NGOs. Articles will be fact-based, founded
in trends for new tools and technologies,
energy mixes, demographics, and geographical variations, and focus on the implications
for the future. Research papers on decisionmaking related to energy strategy (with
limited emphasis on tools and methods) will
also be considered. An analysis is subject to
a 10e12 pp article limit.
 Case Study e Problem-oriented short paper
dedicated to specific energy strategy questions with an innovative focus. Case studies
on energy strategy implementation challenges and opportunities are of particular
interest. A Case Study requires a concise
presentation and is subject to a 5 pp article
limit.
 Report Review e A Report Review summarizes, reviews and comments on a single
major energy report, or several major interrelated reports (strategies, scenarios,
statistics), published by international and
national organizations, such as energy
agencies and corporations. All peerreviewed Report Reviews must aim to
achieve a good balance between graphical
display of data, methodology and conclusions. Depending on the scope, the article
page limit can vary from 1 to 5 pp.

Launching in 2012 Energy Strategy

Reviews will fill the gap between the technical and scientific energy journals and
the reports published by agencies, consultancies and businesses. Energy Strategy Reviews
offers a focused peer-reviewed platform for
articles on energy strategy, planning, decision making, modeling and analysis. We
feature the following sections:

Commissioned content

 Analysis e Authoritative, full-length analysis

of the drivers, trends, scenarios, and ramifications of national and international energy

The journal appears quarterly with 4

issues planned for 2012. The journal content
for the first few issues is mostly commissioned

2211-467X/$ e see front matter 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.esr.2011.11.001

Editorial / Energy Strategy Reviews 1 (2012) 1e2

from known experts, to ensure high quality

and focus. However, authors with relevant,
high-quality output are strongly encouraged
to submit their papers to the journal. In the
first year, each issue will be thematic with
emphasis on a particular energy resource.
Issues are now planned as follows: #1 Focus
on Natural Gas and Energy Strategy, #2: Focus
on Oil and Energy Strategy, #3: Focus on Coal
and Electrical Power Strategies, #4: Focus on
Nuclear Energy Strategies.
The Journal will provide a platform for
new insights and relevant results that serve
the interest of authors and readers from all
parts of the world by providing comprehensive and top-quality coverage. Researchers
are increasingly under pressure to publish
articles in journals with high impact actors.
Funding agencies expect researchers to
publish in journals with high impact factors.
ESR would like to establish a respectable
impact factor ideally after two year of first
publication.
Challenges
Energy strategy and its impact on energy
market dynamics play a central role in solving
the worlds energy needs. The global energy
market is considerably impacted by the meteoric rise of China, which has overtaken the US
as worlds largest energy consumer in 2009.
China will also overtake the US role as the
worlds largest scientific output generator
by 2013 (Fig. 1) - and it is set to become
the worlds largest economy by 2016 (on
purchasing-power-parity basis; and in 2019
using real growth and exchange rates). The
explosive growth in article output of China is
unique. While India is catching up, output
numbers are still modest but the growth
percentage is impressive (Fig. 1). The
geographical shift in the energy balance is
reflected in the worlds scientific output. A
gradual adaptation of journals authors and
editorial boards takes place to mirror the
rise of Asia. ESR will follow that trend.
Editorial board
Our Editorial Board taps into a network of
the worlds premier energy system modelers
and covers the entire field of energy strategy.
We exercise the following tasks and responsibilities: (1) Re-adjusting, influencing and
safe-guarding the strategic direction for and
positioning of the journal from time to time

Fig. 1. China versus US world share of total article output (1996-2008) extrapolated with a linear best-fit trend.
Selected country shares of global output are also included. Source: Scopus Country Data, October 2010; Elsevier Editors
Update Issue 33 September 2011 volume 3.

and when necessary, (2) suggesting and editing special issues, and (3) mobilizing an ever
expanding network of reviewers to get the
job done. The profiles of our Editors are outlined at the journals web portal (www.
elsevier.com/locate/esr).
The Editor-in-Chief screens and makes an
initial assessment on the suitability of all manuscripts submitted for potential publication in
Energy Strategy Reviews. We only send manuscripts out for review if these meet the scope
of the journal, with an emphasis on originality
and significance in the broad development of
the energy strategy field.
The Associate Editors advise the Editor-inChief on the decision categories (rejection,
minor revision, major revision, acceptance)
based on the detailed reports of the
reviewers commissioned by them. The workflow between the Editor-in-Chief, Associate
Editors and Reviewers is assisted by the Elsevier on-line journal management system.
Freely available and webcast
Energy Strategy Reviews, in its first year,
will be made freely available to ScienceDirect
users (http://www.sciencedirect.com/) to
maximize awareness worldwide and to build

the journals profile and impact right from

the start. ScienceDirect is Elseviers leading
full-text scientific database offering journal
articles and book chapters from more than
2,500 peer-reviewed journals and more than
11,000 books. ScienceDirect is a vital daily
source of information for more than 16 million
researchers, scientists and professionals
around the globe. The ScienceDirect Energy
area alone has close to 500,000 unique visitors each month and more than 3 million
page views per month. In addition the journal
will be automatically listed in Scopus (http://
www.scopus.com/home.url), the worlds
largest abstract and citation database of
peer-reviewed literature and quality web
sources. ESR will be promoted at the World
Future Energy Summit held in Abu Dhabi,
January 2012 (http://www.worldfutureener
gysummit.com/).
Ruud Weijermars, Editor-in-Chief
Delft University of Technology,
The Netherlands
Henri van Dorssen, Executive Publisher
Elsevier Limited, UK
Available online 7 November 2011