Jan Kjärstad

Prospects for CO2 capture in European industry

Purpose – The aim of this study is to assess the role of CO2 capture and storage (CCS) technologies in the reduction of CO2 emissions from European industries. Design/methodology/approach – A database covering all industrial installations included in the EU ETS has been created. Potential capture sources have been identified and the potential for CO2 capture has been estimated based on branch- and plant-specific conditions. Emphasis is placed here on three branches of industry with promising prospects for CCS: mineral oil refineries, iron and steel, and cement manufacturers. Findings – A relatively small number (~270) of large installations (>500,000?tCO2/year) dominates emissions from the three branches investigated in this study. Together these installations emit 432?MtCO2/year, 8 percent of EUs total greenhouse gas emissions. If the full potential of emerging CO2 capture technologies was realized, some 270-330?MtCO2 emissions could be avoided annually. Further, several regions have been singled out as particularly suitable to facilitate integrated CO2 transport networks. The most promising prospects for an early deployment of CCS are found in the regions bordering the North Sea. Research limitations/implications – Replacement/retrofitting of the existing plant stock will involve large investments and deployment will take time. It is thus important to consider how the current industry structure influences the potential to reduce CO2 in the short- medium and long term. It is concluded that the age structure of the existing industry plant stock and its implications for the timing and deployment rate of CO2 capture and other mitigation measures are important and should therefore be further investigated. Practical implications – CCS has been recognized as a key option for reducing CO2 emissions within the EU. This assessment shows that considerable emission reductions could be achieved by targeting large point sources in some of the most emission-intensive industries. Yet, a number of challenges need to be resolved in all parts of the CCS chain. Efforts need to be intensified from all stakeholders to gain more experience with the technological, economical and social aspects of CCS. Originality/value – This study provides a first estimate of the potential role for CO2 capture technologies in lowering CO2 emissions from European heavy industry. By considering wider system aspects as well as plant-specific conditions the assessment made in this study gives a realistic overview of the prospects and practical limitations of CCS in EU industry.

Simulating future paths of the European power generation—applying the chalmers power plant database to the British and German power generation system

Publisher Summary This chapter presents a newly established database of the European power plant infrastructure which is applied in a simple simulation analysis of the British and German power generation up to the year 2050. The results are discussed with respect to age structure of the current production plants, CO2 emissions, natural gas dependency, and CO2 capture. The results show that combination of a relatively low growth rate in power generation, ambitious national plans on renewable together with a strong expansion in the use of natural gas can meet national reduction targets in CO2 emissions. However, for both countries this results in a strong dependency on natural gas. Successful application of CO2 capture will reduce this dependency since this would allow for a significant amount of coal based generation, which will contribute to security of supply.

The threat to climate change mitigation posed by the abundance of fossil fuels

ABSTRACT This article analyses the trends in primary demand for fossil fuels and renewables, comparing regions with large and small domestic fossil fuel reserves. We focus on countries that hold 80% of global fossil fuel reserves and compare them with key countries that have meagre fossil fuel reserves. We show that those countries with large domestic fossil fuel reserves have experienced a large increase in primary energy demand from fossil fuels, but only a moderate or no increase in primary energy from renewables, and in particular from non-hydro renewable energy sources (NHRES), which are assumed to represent the cornerstone of the future transformation of the global energy system. This implies a tremendous threat to climate change mitigation, with only two principal mitigation options for fossil-fuel-rich economies if there is to be compliance with the temperature goals of the Paris Agreement: (1) leave the fossil fuels in the ground; and (2) apply carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies. Combinations of these two options to exploit their respective possibilities synergistically will require strong initiatives and incentives to transform a certain amount of the domestic fossil fuel reserves (including the associated infrastructure) into stranded assets and to create an extensive CCS infrastructure. Our conclusion is that immediate and disruptive changes to the use of fossil fuels and investments in non-carbon-emitting technologies are required if global warming is to be limited to well below 2°C. Collective actions along value chains in business to divert from fossil fuels may be a feasible strategy. Key policy insights The main obstacle to compliance with any reasonable warming target is the abundance of fossil fuels, which has maintained and increased momentum towards new fossil-fuelled processes. So far, there has been no increase in the share of NHRES in total global primary energy demand, with a clear decline in the NHRES share in India and China. There is an immediate need for the global community to develop fossil fuel strategies and policies. Policies must account for the global trade flow of products that typically occurs from the newly industrialized fossil fuel-rich countries to the developed countries.

The role of biomass to replace fossil fuels in a regional energy system - the case of West Sweden

This paper analyses and discusses the potential role of biomass in the energy supply for two counties in the West of Sweden. More specifically this work analysis the role of biomass for a scenario that meets the CO2 emission reduction targets up to year 2050, i.e. the role of biomass is estimated as part of an overall emission reduction portfolio (other renewables, less energy use in industry and in the building stock, measures in the transportation sector and CCS in the industry). The region follows the Swedish national target for GHG-emissions, namely zero net emissions by 2050 and, thus, this is the main motivation for enhancing the use of renewables including biomass. The region also complies with the national target of a transport sector independent of fossil fuels by 2030. It is concluded that the region could double its production capacity of solid biomass to 2030 – from a current level of 6TWh to 12 TWh. Modelling of the electricity sector in the region indicates that bio-based electricity generation in CHPs could, in a cost-efficient way, be raised from 1.2 TWh in 2012 to between 2.2 and 3.7 TWh in 2050 and that generation of DH in CHPs would increase from around 4 TWh in 2012 (fossil plus bio/waste) to between 4.5 and 7.5 TWh in 2050 (bio/waste only). Assuming a conversion efficiency of 0.35 for bio-based electricity generation imply a biomass consumption in 2050 ranging from 6.3 to 10.6 TWh for the two scenarios investigated. In both cases, this is well below the production potential for biomass within the region. For the transport sector it is shown in order for the region to reach zero CO2 emissions by 2050, that a series of actions will be required to significantly reduce demand in combination with use of electricity and biofuels. It is estimated that the transport sector in the region will consume some 12.8 TWh biomass annually from 2030 onwards. It is also concluded that such a transformation is unlikely to occur only in the West of Sweden but rather it can be expected that such a development in West Sweden will be part of an overall European transformation of the transport sector. It is concluded that total biomass consumption in the region could potentially more than triple from 14 TWh in 2010 to 48 TWh in 2040, considering the electricity and transport sectors and under the assumption that all heat (DH and industrial heat) should be generated by biomass. Yet, assuming that biomass also replace the fossil based raw materials used by the industry in the region this would raise demand to more than 170 TWh from 2040 onwards, which would imply significant logistical challenges and which can be compared with the current 132 TWh total Swedish biomass supply for energy purposes.

Regional Distribution of Renewable Energy and the Abundance of Fossil Fuels

This paper discusses the extent to which technologies developed for the exploitation of renewable energy sources (RES) can be expected to substitute for fossil fuels, toward the goal of reducing usage of fossil fuels. We compare the changes in fuel mix for primary energy consumption and for electricity generation over the past decade between regions with large and small domestic fossil fuel resources. We conclude that for newly industrialized countries rich in domestic fossil fuels, there is only a moderate or no increase in primary energy from RES, coupled with significant increases in primary energy consumption from fossil fuels although recent but preliminary data show these trends to weaken. We use the notion of a “fossil fuel curse,” which implies that it is not obvious that countries with large domestic fossil fuel resources will allow these assets to remain unexploited. This obviously imposes a tremendous threat to climate change mitigation leaving only two choices for fossil-rich economies: leave the fossil fuels in the ground and apply carbon capture technologies, both options calling for a sufficiently high cost to emit CO2 or other policy intervention in order to take place.