Zoi Vrontisi

Climate Impacts in Europe. The JRC PESETA II Project

The objective of the JRC PESETA II project is to gain insights into the sectoral and regional patterns of climate change impacts in Europe by the end of this century. The study uses a large set of climate model runs and impact categories (ten impacts: agriculture, energy, river floods, droughts, forest fires, transport infrastructure, coasts, tourism, habitat suitability of forest tree species and human health). The project integrates biophysical direct climate impacts into a macroeconomic economic model, which enables the comparison of the different impacts based on common metrics (household welfare and economic activity). Under the reference simulation the annual total damages would be around €190 billion/year, almost 2% of EU GDP. The geographical distribution of the climate damages is very asymmetric with a clear bias towards the southern European regions. More than half of the overall annual EU damages are estimated to be due to the additional premature mortality (€120 billion). Moving to a 2°C world would reduce annual climate damages by €60 billion, to €120 billion (1.2% of GDP).

Residual fossil CO2 emissions in 1.5-2 °c pathways

The Paris Agreement—which is aimed at holding global warming well below 2 °C while pursuing efforts to limit it below 1.5 °C—has initiated a bottom-up process of iteratively updating nationally determined contributions to reach these long-term goals. Achieving these goals implies a tight limit on cumulative net CO2 emissions, of which residual CO2 emissions from fossil fuels are the greatest impediment. Here, using an ensemble of seven integrated assessment models (IAMs), we explore the determinants of these residual emissions, focusing on sector-level contributions. Even when strengthened pre-2030 mitigation action is combined with very stringent long-term policies, cumulative residual CO2 emissions from fossil fuels remain at 850–1,150 GtCO2 during 2016–2100, despite carbon prices of US

Impact of low oil prices on the EU economy

130–420 per tCO2 by 2030. Thus, 640–950 GtCO2 removal is required for a likely chance of limiting end-of-century warming to 1.5 °C. In the absence of strengthened pre-2030 pledges, long-term CO2 commitments are increased by 160–330 GtCO2, further jeopardizing achievement of the 1.5 °C goal and increasing dependence on CO2 removal.Residual CO2 emissions from fossil fuels limit the likelihood of meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement. A sector-level assessment of residual emissions using an ensemble of IAMs indicates that 640–950 GtCO2 removal will be required to constrain warming to 1.5 °C.

Energy Demand and GHG Mitigation Options

The report describes the importance of oil for the EU economy and analyses the potential economic effects that current low oil prices since mid-2014 may have in the EU28 economy. Further it assesses how the current oil price decrease may evolve up to 2020 and the consequences for global oil consumption. The analysis shows that a decrease of the oil price from US

A global stocktake of the Paris pledges: Implications for energy systems and economy

100 to US

Enhancing global climate policy ambition towards a 1.5 °C stabilization: a short-term multi-model assessment

50 may lead to a GDP gain of about 0.7%, both on a global level and in the EU28, driven by private consumption and investment. The global gains are not evenly distributed. Net oil importing countries gain, whereas oil exporting countries lose. The analysis mainly focuses on the EU28 and it shows that the more oil-intensive countries and sectors gain more than the rest of the economy. A 50% decrease of the oil price may generate up to 3 million additional jobs (1.3% of the total labour force). Interestingly, oil-intensive sectors do not necessarily improve their competitiveness vis-A -vis their competitors in other regions, as non-EU producers may be less energy efficient and therefore benefit more from low oil prices.

GECO2015 Global Energy and Climate Outlook: Road to Paris. Assessment of Low Emission Levels under World Action Integrating National Contributions

This chapter presents an analysis of the conditions under which energy can be a lever of sustainable development for the N. Africa (The countries considered are: Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia.) countries in the context of intensification of greenhouse gas abatement policies. The analysis begins with the identification of the distribution, uses and potential uses of the energy resources in the N. African countries. Then growth opportunities for N. African economies are examined in the context of an increasing intensity of climate policy and of a widening of its geographical scope providing opportunities for cross border integration of energy markets, for extension of emission permit markets and the use of JI and CDM development mechanisms (JI (Joint Implementation) and CDM (Clean Development Mechanism) are market instruments introduced in the Kyoto Protocol). In particular, alternative scenario simulations are used to analyze how the N. African countries may gain from incorporation into Europe’s greenhouse gas abatement effort. From a methodological point of view the analysis is performed by means of a computable general equilibrium model, named GEM-E3-Med, specifically constructed for the CIRCE project (CIRCE Integrated Project – Climate Change and Impact Research: the Mediterranean Environment. Supported by the European Commission’s Sixth Framework Programme, Sustainable Development, Global Change and Ecosystems). The analysis is quantitative and focuses on the effect of alternative scenarios on competitiveness, welfare, employment and economic growth of the Mediterranean economies and in particular the N. African countries.