Boom and Bust TRACKING the GLOBAL COAL PLANT PIPELINE
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Boom and Bust TRACKING THE GLOBAL COAL PLANT PIPELINE Christine Shearer, Nicole Ghio, Lauri Myllyvirta, and Ted Nace BOOM AND BUST ABOUT COALSWARM AUTHORS CoalSwarm, a project of Earth Island This report was prepared by Christine Shearer, Nicole Institute, is a network of researchers Ghio, Lauri Myllyvirta and Ted Nace. Christine Shearer seeking to develop collaborative infor- is Program Director of CoalSwarm. Nicole Ghio is a mational resources on coal impacts and alternatives. campaign representative for Sierra Club’s International Current projects include identifying and mapping pro- Climate Program. Lauri Myllyvirta is Senior Global posed and existing coal projects worldwide, including Campaigner, Coal and Air Pollution, at Greenpeace. plants, mines, and infrastructure. www.coalswarm.org. Ted Nace is Executive Director of CoalSwarm. ABOUT THE SIERRA CLUB ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The Sierra Club is America’s largest and The following people provided helpful feedback most influential grassroots environ- on drafts of the report: Tim Buckley (IEEFA), Bob mental organization, with more than Burton (CoalSwarm), Ashish Fernandes (Greenpeace), 2.4 million members and supporters. Aviva Imhof (The Sunrise Project), Mark Kresowik In addition to helping people from all backgrounds (Sierra Club), Michael Lazarus (Stockholm Environ- explore nature and our outdoor heritage, the Sierra ment Institute), Sherri Liang (Sierra Club), and Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the Aiqun Yu (CoalSwarm). health of our communities, protect wildlife, and pre- serve our remaining wild places through grassroots The report was designed by Charlene Will. Page layout activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. was by David Van Ness. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org. PERMISSIONS/COPYRIGHT ABOUT THE GLOBAL COAL PLANT TRACKER This publication may be reproduced in whole or in part and in any form for educational or non-profit The Global Coal Plant Tracker identifies, maps, purposes without special permission from the copy- describes, and categorizes every known coal-fired right holders, provided that acknowledgement of the generating unit proposed since January 1, 2010. Devel- source is made. No use of this publication may be oped by the research group CoalSwarm, the tracker made for resale or other commercial purpose without uses public sources to document each plant and is the written permission of the copyright holders. designed to support longitudinal monitoring. The fol- lowing people participated in plant-by-plant research: Copyright © March 2015 Elena Bixel, Bob Burton, Gregor Clark, Joshua Frank, by CoalSwarm and Sierra Club Ted Nace, Christine Shearer, Adrian Wilson, and Aiqun Yu. Additional wiki editing and fact checking was provided by Christine Law, Iris Shearer, Austin Woerner, and Yvette Zhu. The tracker architect and project manager was Ted Nace. Web/GIS programming was done by Tom Allnutt and Gregor Allensworth of GreenInfo Network, with support from Tim Sinnott of GreenInfo Network. COALSWARM / SIERRA CLUB REPORT | MARCH 2015 | 2 Boom and Bust TRACKING THE GLOBAL COAL PLANT PIPELINE Christine Shearer, Nicole Ghio, Lauri Myllyvirta, and Ted Nace for every plant completed. In Europe, South EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Asia, Latin America, and Africa, the failure-to- From 2005 to 2012, worldwide coal-fired generating completion rate is 4:1 or higher. The amount of capacity boomed, growing at three times the previous new coal-fired generating capacity in the proposal pace. The increase in the global coal fleet was twice pipeline worldwide dropped from 1,401 GW in the size of the entire existing U.S. coal fleet. That 2012 to 1,080 GW in 2014, a 23 percent decline. boom is now busting. In India, projects shelved or ■■ The proposed coal plant pipeline remains highly cancelled since 2012 outnumber project completions dangerous. Even if the trend of two coal plant by six to one, and new construction initiations are at a proposals halted for every one plant built contin- near-standstill. In both Europe and the U.S., the coal ues, the remaining one-third will use up nearly fleet is shrinking, with retirements outnumbering all of the available carbon budget for avoiding the new plants. China faces a looming glut in coal-fired internationally recognized 2°C warming thresh- generating capacity, with plant utilization rates at a old. Stronger efforts are needed to curb new coal 35-year low. capacity. Bad news for coal builders is good news for the ■■ China faces a capacity glut. In 2014, China climate and public health. Because coal is the most recorded a 1.6 percent decline in power genera- carbon-intensive fossil fuel and coal plants have a long tion from coal, and the overall utilization rate for lifespan, growth in coal capacity has major implica- thermal plants declined to 54 percent, the lowest tions for climate stability. In addition to its effect on level in over three decades. Although coal capac- climate, pollution from coal combustion is responsible ity additions fell by half from 2006 to 2014, China for an estimated 800,000 premature deaths each year. needs to cancel more proposed coal plants to avoid This report provides the results of a worldwide survey large amounts of stranded or underutilized coal- completed in January 2015 by the Global Coal Plant fired capacity. Tracker. It includes the following conclusions: ■■ India’s coal boom has withered. Grassroots citizen ■■ Boom is turning to bust. After a period of extraor- opposition, coal supply issues, and other prob- dinary growth, worldwide coal plant construction lems have caused financing for new coal plants to has slowed rapidly due to increasingly effective dry up. Although 69 GW of capacity is still under citizen opposition, competition from renewables, construction due to a surge in construction starts and economic restructuring. Since 2010, two prior to 2012, less than 10 GW of new construc- plants have been shelved or cancelled worldwide tion has started since mid-2012. For every project COALSWARM / SIERRA CLUB REPORT | MARCH 2015 | 3 BOOM AND BUST completed in India since mid-2012, six projects have been shelved or cancelled. Nevertheless, approximately 300 GW of capacity remains in plan- ning, a potentially dangerous carbon bomb. ■■ In the United States and the European Union, coal capacity continues a long-term decline. From 2003 to 2014, the amount of coal-fired generating capacity retired in the US and the EU exceeded new capacity by 22 percent. With most new capacity plans halted and large amounts of capacity slated for retirement, reductions in coal capacity are expected to accelerate. ■■ Some countries are defying the slowdown. Con- centrations of proposed new coal-fired generating capacity can still be found in Turkey, Vietnam, Indonesia, Poland, and the Balkans. The Global Coal Plant Tracker identifies, maps, describes, and categorizes every known coal-fired generating unit proposed since January 1, 2010. Devel- oped by the research group CoalSwarm, the tracker uses public sources to document each plant and is designed to support longitudinal monitoring. COALSWARM / SIERRA CLUB REPORT | MARCH 2015 | 4 PART I GLOBAL RESULTS In addition to greenhouse gases, fine particle pollu- INTRODUCTION tion from coal causes an estimated 800,000 premature 1 Carbon dioxide emissions from coal are the largest deaths annually. Valuations of climate and health contributor to global climate change. From 2004 to effects, along with other external costs such as water 2013, increased coal utilization outweighed all other pollution, agricultural losses, and damage to natural sources combined, producing 62 percent of global ecosystems, place the actual cost of coal-fired electric- carbon dioxide emissions growth from fossil fuels ity generation to society at two to four times market and cement (Global Carbon Project 2014). Due to the price (Epstein 2011, Auffhammer 2011, Muller et al. long lifespan of coal plants, typically 40 years or more, 2011, Shindell 2015). The economic damage from one large coal capacity additions represent a particularly tonne of CO2 emissions has recently been estimated serious threat to climate stability. at US$242 (Moore and Diaz 2015); a typical coal plant 2 generates about 4.4 million tonnes of CO2 per year. Figure 1. Worldwide Coal-Fired Generation Net Capacity Additions, 1980–1993 Source: Platts WEPP January 2015 and CoalSwarm analysis 1. China: 670,000 premature deaths annually (Abrams 2014); India: 80,000–115,000 (Goenka and Guttikunda 2013); United States: 13,200 (Schneider and Banks 2010); European Union plus Serbia, Croatia, and Turkey: 23,300 (Jensen 2013). 2. Assumes 1000 MW, 58% capacity factor, supercritical combustion (9080 Btu/kWh), subbituminous coal (211.9 pounds of carbon dioxide per million Btu). COALSWARM / SIERRA CLUB REPORT | MARCH 2015 | 5 BOOM AND BUST Figure 2. Comparison of Global Coal-Fired 52 citizen groups. The tracker pools data on proposed Generating Capacity Increase to U.S. coal plants worldwide, providing detailed information Coal-Fired Generating Capacity in map and tabular form for 3,900 generating units in the developmental pipeline since January 1, 2010.3 Each project is linked to a footnoted wiki page curated by CoalSwarm. This report summarizes the findings of the tracker. Appendix A explains the tracker architecture and methodology. Appendix B shows national totals for existing coal capacity worldwide. Appendix C provides a full list of proposed coal projects by country and links each project to a wiki page