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Under the framework of the UN framework convention on climate change (UNFCCC) and its Kyoto Protocol the targets and strategies for the second and third commitment period ("post-2012") have to be discussed and set in the near future. Regarding the substantial emission reductions that have to be shouldered by the industrialized nations over the next two decades it is evident that all available potentials to mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have to be harnessed and that energy efficiency has to play a key role.
To substantiate this we developed a comprehensive scenario analysis of the EU 25s energy system and other greenhouse gas emissions until 2020. Our analysis shows which key potentials to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions are available, by which policies and measures they are attainable
and which will be benefits of greenhouse gas mitigation measures.
By this analysis we show the mayor role of energy efficiency in all sectors and all member states. We demonstrate that a reduction of EU 25 greenhouse gas emissions by more than 30 % by 2020 is feasible, reasonable and - to a large extent - cost effective. We also develop a comprehensive policy package necessary to achieve ambitious Post-Kyoto targets.
The scenario analysis results in a clear identification of the needed strategies, policies and measures and especially the relevance of energy efficiency to achieve the necessary ambitious greenhouse gas reduction targets. It also clearly shows the costs and the benefits of such a policy compared to a business as usual case.
Toothless tiger? : Is the EU action plan on energy efficiency sufficient to reach its target?
(2007)
Motivated by, inter alia, the increasing energy prices, the security of energy supply and climate change, the new EU "Action Plan for Energy Efficiency: Realising the Potential" (EEAP), sets out the policies and measures required to be implemented over the next six years to achieve the EU's goal of reducing annual primary energy consumption by about 20 % by 2020. By increasing energy efficiency, the security of energy supply and the reduction of carbon emissions are also improved.
The paper will analyse the 20 % target of the new EEAP for the energy demand side by comparison with different recent energy scenarios for the EU. It will therefore review the recommended policies and measures and examine, in which energy demand sectors energy efficiency may be increased and to which extend. The main focus is whether the recommended policies and actions will be sufficient and which additional measures may be useful, if additional measures are needed.
Iran is one of the largest oil producers and natural gas owners globally. However, it has to struggle with domestic energy shortages, economic losses through energy subsidisation and inefficient energy infrastructures. Furthermore, GHG and other energy related emissions are rapidly increasing and posing a growing threat to local environment as well as global climate. With current trends prevailing, Iran may even become a net energy importer over the next decades. Resource allocation is therefore a crucial challenge for Iran: domestic consumption stands versus exports of energy.
The energy transformation sector clarifies Iran's dilemma: soaring electricity demand leads to blackouts, and power plant new builds are far from using most efficient technologies (e. g. CHP), therefore keeping energy intensive structures. But fossil fuels could be sold on international markets if spared by having more efficient energy infrastructures.
As shown by the high energy intensity of its economy, Iran has large potentials for energy saving and efficiency. In order to highlight and better identify this potential the paper contrasts a high efficiency scenario in all sectors of energy transformation and consumption with a possible "business as usual" development.
Using a bottom-up approach, the analysis provides a sector-by-sector perspective on energy saving potentials. These can be utilised on the demand side especially in the transport sector (fuels) and in households (electricity for appliances, natural gas for heating). Electricity generation bears efficiency potentials as well.
We conclude that Iran, but also the international community, would benefit on various levels from a more energy-efficient Iranian economy: Energy exports could increase, generating more foreign currency and reducing the pressures on international oil and gas prices; energy consumption would decrease, leading to lower needs for nuclear energy and for subsidies to Iranian people, as well as to a reduction of the high external costs entailed by fossil fuels combustion (smog in cities, environmental stress).
Based on a comprehensive scenario analysis of the EU's GHG emissions by 2020, we show that the 20% energy savings target set in the Action Plan "Doing more with less" in 2006 is still the most significant and thus indispensable strategy element within an ambitious EU climate and energy strategy targeting at a 30% reduction of GHG emissions by 2020.
The scenario analysis provides a sector by sector projection of potential future energy use and GHG emissions, combined with a detailed policy analysis of the core policies on energy efficiency by the EU and its Member States taken from current research results by the authors and others.
Consequently the paper identifies and quantifies the current implementation deficit in the EU and shows that, despite of sufficient targets, implementation is still significantly lacking in almost all fields of energy efficiency. Some, e.g. transport sector and buildings, are still substantially far from receiving the necessary political impetus. The paper also demonstrates co-benefits of a strong energy efficiency strategy, e.g. the achievability of the targets of the RES directive, which crucially depends on a strong efficiency policy.
We conclude that the efforts of the energy efficiency policy of the EU and its Member States have to be significantly intensfied. As proposed by the EU in case that other developed and key developing countries take up comparable targets in order to fulfil its role in the climate and energy strategy. To achieve this, we offer an analysis of the current weaknesses of EU energy efficiency policy and derive recommendations on how the EU can still reach its targets for 2020.
International consensus is growing that a transition towards a low carbon society (LCS) is needed over the next 40 years. The G8, the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate, as well as the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, have concluded that states should prepare their own Low-emission Plans or Low-emission Development Plans and such plans are in development in an increasing number of countries.
An analysis of recent long-term low emission scenarios for Germany shows that all scenarios rely heavily on a massive scale up of energy efficiency improvements based on past trends. However, in spite of the high potential that scenario developers assign to this strategy, huge uncertainty still exists in respect of where the efficiency potentials really lie, how and if they can be achieved and how much their successful implementation depends on more fundamental changes towards a more sustainable society (e.g. behavioural changes).
In order to come to a better understanding of this issue we specifically examine the potential for energy efficiency in relation to particular demand sectors. Our comparative analysis shows that despite general agreement about the high importance of energy efficiency (EE), the perception on where and how to achieve it differ between the analysed scenarios. It also shows that the close nexus between energy efficiency and non-technical behavioural aspects is still little understood. This leads us to the conclusion that in order to support energy policy decisions more research should be done on energy efficiency potential. A better understanding of its potential would help energy efficiency to fulfil its role in the transition towards a LCS.
Several low-carbon energy roadmaps and scenarios have recently been published by the European Commission and the International Energy Agency (IEA) as well as by various stakeholders such as Eurelectric, ECF and Greenpeace. Discussions of these studies mainly focus on technology options available on the electricity supply side and mostly omit the significant challenges that all of the scenarios impose on the energy demand side.
A comparison of 5 decarbonisation scenarios from 4 of the most relevant recent scenario studies for the EU shows that all of them imply significant efficiency improvements in traditional appliances, usually well above levels historically observed over longer periods of time. At the same time they assume substantial electrification of transportation and heating. The scenarios suggest that both of these challenges need to be tackled successfully for decarbonising the energy system.
With shares of renewable electricity reaching at least 60 % of supply in 2050 in almost all of the decarbonisation scenarios, the adaptation of demand to variable supply becomes increasingly important. This aspect of demand side management should therefore be part of any policy mix aiming for a low-carbon power system.
Based on a quantitative analysis of 5 decarbonisation scenarios and a comparison with historical evidence we derive the (implicit) new challenges posed by the current low-carbon roadmaps and develop recommendations for energy policy on the electricity demand side.
This paper draws upon an extensive transdisciplinary scenario development in the context of the stakeholder oriented preparation of the climate protection plan of the German federal state North Rhine-Westphalia, which is home to the most important heavy industry cluster in Europe. In that context we developed differentiated bottom up climate change mitigation strategies and scenarios for the major energy intensive industries aluminium, iron and steel, cement, lime, paper and steam cracker for olefin production together with representatives of industry as well as society.
Nach einer langen Phase der Stabilität ist die Stromwirtschaft in den vergangenen 15 Jahren stark in Bewegung geraten. Zunächst stand der Wechsel von staatlich überwachten und regulierten Gebietsmonopolen hin zu liberalisierten Erzeuger- und Verbrauchermärkten an. Im Moment befinden wir uns in einem ähnlichen Umbruch, weg von konventioneller hin zu erneuerbarer Energieerzeugung.
Im vorliegenden Beitrag soll der Leitfrage nachgegangen werden, ob die Paradigmen der einzelnen Phasen miteinander vereinbar sind, welche noch immer ihre Daseinsberechtigung haben und welche modifiziert werden sollten.
Die Transformation des Energieversorgungssystems zu einer dekarbonisierten Energiebereitstellung bedingt ein koordiniertes Zusammenspiel der Sektoren Strom, Wärme und Verkehr. Dabei ist die Kopplung des Stromsektors mit dem Wärmesektor eine der entscheidenden Maßnahmen bei der Transformation. Die Aufnahme von Wind- und Sonnenenergie in das Netz kann durch genaue Einspeiseprognosen optimiert werden, die Kopplung zum Wärmesektor mittels Wärmepumpen und Power-to-Heat (Heizstab) ermöglicht die weitere Flexibilisierung der Nachfrageseite. Diese Interaktion wird durch intelligente Lösungen der Systemtechnik für das Energie- und Netzmanagement ermöglicht. Die Entwicklung von entsprechenden Anreizsystemen, Marktmechanismen und Geschäftsmodellen ist ebenfalls erforderlich, um diese Kopplung auch wirtschaftlich erfolgreich zu gestalten. Der Beitrag stellt das im Forschungsvorhaben "Interaktion EE-Strom, Wärme und Verkehr" erstellte 80-Prozent-Szenario für das Jahr 2050 vor und zeigt anhand von Beispielen zukünftige Anforderungen und Entwicklungen zu dieser Thematik auf.
Energy intensive industries are one of the fields in which strong increases of energy efficiency and deep decarbonisation strategies are particularly challenging. Although European energy intensive industries have already achieved significant energy and greenhouse gas reductions in the past, much remains to be done to make a significant contribution to achieving European as well as national climate mitigation targets of greenhouse gas emission reductions by -80% or more (compared to the baseline of 1990). North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) is a European hotspot for coping with this challenge, accommodating more than 10% of the energy intensive industries of the EU28. It is also the first German state to have adopted its own Climate Law, enacting state-wide CO2 emission reductions by 80% until 2050 compared to 1990. The state government initiated the project "Platform Climate Protection and Industry North-Rhine Westphalia" to identify and develop the necessary far-reaching low carbon innovation strategies for energy intensive industries. Heart of the project was a dialogue process, which involved a broad spectrum of stakeholders from steel, chemical, aluminium, cement, glass and paper producing industries. Besides enhancing and broadening the knowledge on high efficiency and low-carbon technologies within industries, the aim was to explore possible pathways and preconditions for the application of these technologies in energy intensive industries as well as to strengthen the motivation of companies for initiatives and investments in technologies with lower CO2 emissions. The results of the dialogue shall provide a basis for a possible low-carbon industry roadmap NRW and may also serve as an example for other industrialized regions in the EU and globally. The paper sketches the structured dialogue process with the stakeholders from companies as well as industrial associations and presents the learnings regarding the engagement of energy intensive industries into ambitious climate policies on a regional level. These include existing limitations as well as chances in the respective sectors on the state level, regarding their economic and technical structures as well as their innovation systems. The findings are based on more than a dozen stakeholder workshops with industry companies and more than 150 individual representatives of NRW's energy intensive industries as well as on background research in the initial phase of the project.