The Canton of Zürich's Roadmap: Smart Energy Region 2050
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The Canton of Zürich’s Roadmap: Smart Energy Region 2050 Interactive Qualifying Project Report completed In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Science At Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA By: Zachary Burgess Luke Habib Sam Khalandovsky Brandon Malofsky Advisors: Daniel DiMassa Kathryn Fisler Sponsoring Agency: The ZHAW School of Engineering Liaison: Tara Mann 10/16/2015 [email protected] Abstract As part of the COST Action Plan, ZHAW has presented a goal of achieving a Smart Energy Region in the Canton of Zürich by the year 2050. This target is defined with milestones across 18 areas such as energy efficiency, quality of life, and renewable technologies. This report assesses those goals and develops a roadmap for the canton to achieve some of them, while recommending that other goals be reevaluated for plausibility. The roadmap is made up of a series of recommendations that could be used by the cantonal government to reach these targets. Additionally, this report provides analyses of each of the 18 relevant areas as well as other roadmaps that have been developed in other cities, providing a strong research base for future work by ZHAW on the Smart Energy Region Project. 1 Acknowledgements This project was something new to the team. We had completed projects for courses before, but our IQP presented new challenges. Our supporters provided us with valuable resources, information, and insight throughout the project. The work they invested contributed to the success of this project. We want to extend our sincerest gratitude to Thea Weiss, Harry Spiess, Vicente Carabias, and Tobias Kuehn at ZHAW for the copious amounts of resources that they provided us with throughout the course of our project. Not many IQP groups can say that their sponsors supported them as much as our sponsors have supported us. It got to the point where we had to ask them to stop giving us resources and contacts that we utilize for the project because there simply was not enough time in the term. They trusted us to do the best that we could and gave us the opportunity to really make this project our own. Special thanks to Tobias for coming with us on some of our interviews and translating some key documents for us during the course of the project. We also want to thank the experts that we interviewed for the project. We never would have imagined that 9 professionals in the fields relevant to our impact variables would not only be able to meet with us for interviews, but would also be excited to meet and respond to our initial correspondences within the first couple days. The information that they provided us was critical to the successful completion of our project and we had much more time to synthesize and analyze that information because they responded so quickly to setting up meetings. 2 Table of Contents Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………………....1 Acknowledgements………………………………………………………………………………..2 Table of Figures…………………………………………………………………………………...4 Executive Summary……………………………………………………………………………….5 Chapter 1: Introduction…………………………………………………………………………....6 Chapter 2: Literature Review……………………………………………………………………...8 2.1: Energy Supply and Consumption…………………………………………………….8 2.2: Private Sector………………………………………………………………………..10 2.2.1: Current Technology……………………………………………………….10 2.2.2: Technology Initiatives…………………………………………………….10 2.2.3: Private and Public Interaction……………………………………………..11 2.3: Public Sector………………………………………………………………………...12 2.3.1: Swiss Federal Government………………………………………………..12 2.3.2: Canton of Zürich…………………………………………………………..13 2.4: Social Aspects……………………………………………………………………….14 2.4.1: Public Support…………………………………...………………………..14 2.4.2: 2000 Watt Society………………………………………………………....15 Chapter 3: Methodology………………………………………………………………………....17 Chapter 4: Data and Analysis…………………………………………………………………....20 4.1: Impact Variables…………………………………………………………………….20 4.2: Roadmaps…………………………………………………………………………....50 Chapter 5: Conclusions and Recommendations………………………………………………....52 5.1: Roadmap Recommendations………………………………………………………..52 5.1.1: Ecological Tax Reform: Light Blue Boxes………………………………..54 5.1.2: Increase Foreign Renewable Electricity: Red Boxes……………………...54 5.1.3: Increase Adoption of Hybrid/Electric Vehicles: Orange Boxes…………..55 5.1.4: Increase in Renewables: Purple Boxes……………………………………55 5.1.5: Building Program Changes: Pink Boxes………………………………….56 5.1.6: Emission Limits: Green Boxes…………………………...……………….56 5.1.7: Combined Heat and Power (CHP) Plants: Yellow Boxes………………...57 5.1.8: Public Interaction, Quality of Life Surveys: Cyan Box…………………...57 5.1.9: Smart Meters, Efficiency Standards, Transmission Lines: White Boxes....57 Works Cited……………………………………………………………………………………...59 3 Table of Figures Figure 1: Resource Consumption by Sector ...................................................................................8 Figure 2: Domestic Electricity Production .....................................................................................9 Figure 3: Daily energy production distribution ....……................................................................32 Figure 4: Projected growth of renewables ...…….........................................................................36 Figure 5: Energy consumption per person .…...............................................................................38 Figure 6: Cantonal vs Predicted Need (Heat) …….………..........................................................39 Figure 7: Cantonal vs Predicted Need (Electricity) ………………..............................................39 Figure 8: CO2 emissions per person ..............................................................................................42 Figure 9: Final Roadmap ..............................................................................................................53 Table 1: Federal Environmental and Energy Legislation ………………….................................12 Table 2: Translation of Figure 4 ...................................................................................................35 Table 3: Mineral Oil Tax ..............................................................................................................46 4 Executive Summary This report provides an analysis of the target 2050 scenario constructed by ZHAW for the Canton of Zürich and develops an initial roadmap towards the development of the canton into a Smart Energy Region by the year 2050. The roadmap focuses on measures that would increase sustainability, decrease energy consumption, accelerate adoption of renewable technologies, and promote infrastructure developments in order to meet goals that the canton has established for 2050. Methods used in this research have primarily been the accumulation and synthesis of data collected through online research and from interviews with experts in the various fields that the roadmap addresses. The report concludes that a number of goals presented by ZHAW for 2050 are impractical and must be reconsidered, and that other goals may need further development. Specifically, ● Current projections for improvements in power storage indicate that it is unreasonable to expect daily load equalization of a household or community level, and unreasonable to expect yearly load equalization on a cantonal or national level. ● The target of 80% of the cantonal population living by the guidelines of a 2000Watt society by 2050 is unlikely to be achieved given that an insignificant number of people are currently able to live in this way. To meet desired goals and move the canton closer to a Smart Energy Region, the report recommends the following steps. The cantonal government should: ● Provide funding for the installation of smart meters for monitoring energy consumption; ● Follow through with planned ecological tax reform by 2025; ● Follow through with planned CO tax increases in 2020 and continue raising the tax over 2 time; ● Increase subsidies on installation of renewable energies; ● Begin subsidies towards development of charging stations for electrical vehicles; ● Increase grants provided towards research of efficient energy storage technologies; ● Develop a process for auditing the energy efficiency of power plants; Additionally, the report presents a number of areas for future research that should be undertaken by ZHAW in the further development of this project. Specifically, the goals for quality of life and power storage need to be reevaluated to create a more plausible goal for 2050. 5 Chapter 1: Introduction Our Interactive Qualifying Project (IQP) team has created a roadmap that can be used to develop the Canton of Zürich into a Smart Energy Region. This project stems from increased concern for climate change and the energy crisis, which are often cited as two of the most important issues to the world’s upcoming generations. While some countries have strived to alleviate both issues, few standards exists internationally to enforce or guide other countries to follow in their footsteps. Many nations now entering their own industrial revolutions, or even developed countries facing tough economic times, contribute to negative impacts on the climate without such standards in place to protect it. However, some European countries, specifically Switzerland, have often been the frontrunners in establishing cleaner energy and taking actions to prevent drastic climate change (2014 EPI, 2015). Switzerland is aiming to reduce fossil fuel dependence and Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions, increase