Achieving a carbon-free electricity sector throughout Europe will require a broad mix of energy sources, the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) Executive Director explained at a meeting of European Union Energy Ministers in Hungary.
“All sectors will have to play their part to achieve emissions intensity improvements, but the sector which sees greatest abatement, and has been the major focus of energy-sector climate policy, is power generation,” Mr Tanaka said.
“In Europe, that decarbonisation process will require a mix of Carbon Capture and Storage-fitted fossil fuel production, as well as renewables and nuclear.”
Given the current uncertainties about the future role of nuclear power, he noted that if Europe follows a ‘low-nuclear, high renewables’ scenario – inline with that presented in the IEA’s Energy Technology Perspectives 2010 – it will require not only the rapid expansion of wind and solar capacity, but also the understanding that a 550 terawatt-hour gap will remain, that must be filled with imports. Mr Tanaka added: “How clean or secure those imports would be is an open question”.
Roadmap 2050
The meeting, taking place on 2 and 3 May in Gödöllo, Hungary, is focusing on Roadmap 2050; an initiative of the European Climate Foundation, which aims to provide analysis of pathways to achieve a low-carbon economy in Europe, in line with the European Union’s (EU) goals.
Mr Tanaka presented scenarios from the World Energy Outlook 2010, the IEA’s flagship annual publication, and explained how they fit in context with Roadmap 2050.
In the World Energy Outlook’s 450 scenario – which sets out an energy pathway consistent with the goal of limiting the global increase in temperature to 2ºC – energy-related CO2 emissions reductions are -21.5% in 2020, -45% in 2030, and -55% in 2035 (all from 1990 levels).
This is similar to the Roadmap 2050, in which European domestic emissions reductions amount to -25% in 2020, -40% in 2030, -60% in 2040, and -80% in 2050 (all from 1990 levels).
Oil burden
The IEA Executive Director also said that combating climate change will reduce the oil burden faced by the 27 member countries of the EU.
“The benefits of low-carbon policies are not only climate-related, but also economic,” he said.
Mr Tanaka explained that in the IEA’s 450 scenario, oil import bills in Europe are less by a third by 2035 (representing more than USD100 billion in savings annually), and the oil import burden falls to less than 1% of GDP.
“Reduced exposure to imports also means reduced exposure to potential supply disruptions, and so a boost to European energy security,” he added. Source; International Energy Agency