Exploring the Driving Factors and Their Mitigation Potential in Global Energy-Related CO2 Emission
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Volume 3 Number 5 October 2020 (413-422) DOI: 10.14171/j.2096-5117.gei.2020.05.001 Production And Global Energy Interconnection Hosting By Elsevier On Behalf Of KeAi Contents lists available at ScienceDirect https: //www.sciencedirect.com/journal/global-energy-interconnection Full-length article Exploring the driving factors and their mitigation potential in global energy-related CO2 emission Zhiyuan Ma1,2, Shining Zhang1,2, Fangxin Hou1,2, Xin Tan1,2, Fengying Zhang1,2, Fang Yang1,2, Fei Guo3 1. Global Energy Interconnection Development and Cooperation Organization, No. 8 Xuanwumennei Street, Beijing 100031, P.R. China 2. Global Energy Interconnection Group Co., Ltd., No. 8 Xuanwumennei Street, Beijing 100031, P.R. China 3. International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Schlossplatz 1-A, 2361 Laxenburg, Austria Scan for more details Abstract: In order to quantify the contribution of the mitigation strategies, an extended Kaya identity has been proposed in this paper for decomposing the various factors that influence the CO2 emission. To this end, we provided a detailed decomposition of the carbon intensity and energy intensity, which enables the quantification of clean energy development and electrification. The logarithmic mean divisia index (LMDI) has been applied to the historical data to quantify the contributions of the various factors affecting the CO2 emissions. Further, the global energy interconnection (GEI) scenario has been introduced for providing a systematic solution to meet the 2°C goal of the Paris Agreement. By combining LMDI with the scenario analysis, the mitigation potential of the various factors for CO2 emission has been analyzed. Results from the historical data indicate that economic development and population growth contribute the most to the increase in CO2 emissions, whereas improvement in the power generation efficiency predominantly helps in emission reduction. A numerical analysis, performed for obtaining the projected future carbon emissions, suggests that clean energy development and electrification are the top two factors that can decrease CO2 emissions, thus showing their great potential for mitigation in the future. Moreover, the carbon capture and storage technology serves as an important supplementary mitigation method. Keywords: CO2 emission, Kaya identity, Clean energy development, Electrification, Global Energy Interconnection, Mitigation potential. 1 Introduction Received: 2 June 2020/ Accepted: 16 July 2020/ Published: 25 October 2020 Energy-related emissions are the main contributors to the Fang Yang Xin Tan total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, with a proportion [email protected] [email protected] of 74% in the year 2015 [1]. From 1990 to 2015, energy- Zhiyuan Ma Fengying Zhang related GHG emissions have increased by over 40% to 12.6 Gt [email protected] [email protected] CO2 equivalent, whereas the total GHG emissions from Shining Zhang Fei Guo industrial processes, agriculture, and other fields have risen [email protected] [email protected] by only 2.7 Gt CO equivalent. The energy sector dominates Fangxin Hou 2 [email protected] carbon emissions as well as climate change. Because energy 2096-5117/© 2020 Global Energy Interconnection Development and Cooperation Organization. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of KeAi Communications Co., Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http: //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ ). 413 Global Energy Interconnection Vol. 3 No. 5 Oct. 2020 consumption continues to rise with the population growth factors, such as gross domestic product (GDP), population, and economic development, effective control measures for electrification, proportion of renewables, etc., influencing energy-related carbon emissions is of great significance the energy-related carbon emissions have been determined to realize the Paris Agreement goals [2]. To this end, it is using the Kaya identity. Secondly, the GEI energy scenario, essential to analyze the driving factors of carbon emissions which is based on promoting large-scale renewable bases in the energy sector and their mitigation potential, in order and development of grid interconnections, has been to formulate emission reduction pathways and strategies. presented by considering the emission path and technology Research on the factors influencing the emissions and portfolios. Thirdly, by using the GEI scenario for the their mitigation potential mainly depends on using historical case of highly developed renewables and electricity that data, such as population, economy, carbon intensity, can meet the goals of the Paris Agreement, the emission and energy intensity according to the Kaya identity or reduction potential and contribution from each component stochastic regression models [3–4], for analysis. Studies have been analyzed depending on the historical as well as where projected data has been used for analysis in a specific optimized projection data. Hence, the emission reduction energy end-use sector have also been conducted [5]. Their contribution from components, such as electrification and results show that population and economic development are proportion of renewables, has been quantitatively analyzed, the main driving factors of energy consumption and carbon and their mitigation potential in the energy sector has been emission growth, whereas the influence of the energy determined. The results obtained from the above-mentioned intensity and carbon intensity is not obvious [6]. This is analysis indicate that the development of renewables and because fossil fuels still dominate the present day energy electricity are the dominant factors that can reduce CO2 consumption, whereas clean energy occupies a lower share. emissions. This creates a significant mitigation potential in Globally, the proportion of clean energy in the total primary the energy sector. energy consumption was only 19% in 2017. As the share The remainder of the paper has been organized as of renewable and clean electricity increases in the future, follows: Section 2 presents the decomposition method for the emission reduction potential of the carbon intensity and analyzing the influence of the different factors on CO2 energy intensity is expected to increase, and is thus worthy emissions and describes the data used. The results of the of a qualitative investigation. With the aim of reducing decomposition obtained by using the historical data have carbon emissions, the global energy interconnection (GEI) been discussed in detail in Section 3. The GEI 2°C energy scenario [7] has been proposed as a systematic solution scenario, based on which the mitigation potential of the for realizing mitigation in the energy sector and the Paris different driving factors is analyzed, has been presented in Agreement goals. In this scenario, a predominantly clean Section 4. Section 5 concludes the study and presents a few energy and electricity-centric energy system has been points on policy implications. established by constructing large-scale renewable sources for power supply and grid interconnections for power 2 Methodology and data allocation. Therefore, the emissions from the energy sector 2.1 Decomposition method based on the Kaya are significantly reduced by promoting “clean replacement,” identity i.e., replacing the fossil fuel energy by renewables in the primary energy, and “electricity replacement,” i.e., The Kaya identity was originally put forward by Yoichi replacing fossil fuels by electricity in the end-use sectors. Kaya in 1989 [11]. It combines carbon emissions with Furthermore, many studies have been conducted with a energy, population, and economic scale in order to quantify consensus that emissions can be significantly reduced by the relative contributions of the key factors, namely human promoting renewables and electricity [8–9]. In particular, population and life, in CO2 emissions. The method of Kaya Jiang et al. conducted a scenario analysis for China to identity has many advantages, such as its simple structure accomplish rapid transition in the power generation sector and residual-free and easy-to-understand analysis. Its [10]. However, there is a lack of quantitative analysis specific formula is given as follows: that can reveal the relationship between renewables, C E GDP CP=⋅⋅⋅ (1) electrification, and carbon emissions. E GDP P In order to overcome the existing deficiencies, a novel In (1), C, E, GDP, and P refer to the total energy-related approach has been proposed in this work for analyzing the carbon emission, total primary energy consumption, gross energy-related carbon emission reduction potential and domestic product, and total population, respectively. Here, the contribution from different driving factors. Firstly, C/E and E/GDP indicate the carbon intensity and energy 414 Zhiyuan Ma et al. Exploring the driving factors and their mitigation potential in global energy-related CO2 emission intensity, respectively. GDP/P refers to the GDP per capita Fe/GDP represents the electricity intensity and indicates the and represents the effect of economic development. influence of the improvements in the energy efficiency and In this study, we have used the revised form of the Kaya economic system on CO2 emissions. identity in order to expand the method for decomposing and Fig. 1 shows a schematic of the proposed decomposition analyzing the energy-related CO2 emissions. For each year, method. Compared to the Kaya identity method (represented