Causal layered analysis of Cogeneration of heat and power innovation system in Iran

Regarding the essential role of energy in the development and international competition on energy resources, policymaking for the energy sector technologies is remarkably vital. On the other hand, the first step to technology policymaking is determining the barriers and problems of technology development and then implementing adequate policies. On this basis, this paper aims at providing a model for technology development analysis based on the technological innovation system approach. Compared to other approaches, the causal layered analysis provides a more concise and deeper analysis and consequently more effective policies and also delineates the correlations between different problems. At first, based on the conceptual model of the research, technological innovation system problems were extracted and divided into five categories of functional, structural, contextual, discursive, and visionary problems. Afterward, the intensity of each problem along with the correlations was determined. While the results of the most previous studies suggest the structural and functional problems to be dissolved, the results here reveal the noticeable effect of contextual, discursive, and visionary problems. In the end, some policy suggestions are provided by the authors to address these macro problems.