| 1. |
- Grubler, Arnulf, et al.
(author)
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Energy Primer
- 2012
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In: Global Energy Assessment - Toward a Sustainable Future. - 9781107005198 ; , s. 99-150
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Book chapter (peer-reviewed)
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| 2. |
- Hickmann, Thomas, et al.
(author)
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Exploring Global Climate Policy Futures and Their Representation in Integrated Assessment Models
- 2022
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In: Politics and Governance. - : Cogitatio. - 2183-2463. ; 10:3, s. 171-185
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The Paris Agreement, adopted in 2015, paved the way for a new hybrid global climate governance architecture with both bottom-up and top-down elements. While governments can choose individual climate goals and actions, a global stocktake and a ratcheting-up mechanism have been put in place with the overall aim to ensure that collective efforts will prevent increasing adverse impacts of climate change. Integrated assessment models show that current combined climate commitments and policies of national governments fall short of keeping global warming to 1.5 °C or 2 °C above preindustrial levels. Although major greenhouse gas emitters, such as China, the European Union, India, the United States under the Biden administration, and several other countries, have made new pledges to take more ambitious climate action, it is highly uncertain where global climate policy is heading. Scenarios in line with long-term temperature targets typically assume a simplistic and hardly realistic level of harmonization of climate policies across countries. Against this backdrop, this article develops four archetypes for the further evolution of the global climate governance architecture and matches them with existing sets of scenarios developed by integrated assessment models. By these means, the article identifies knowledge gaps in the current scenario literature and discusses possible research avenues to explore the pre-conditions for successful coordination of national policies towards achieving the long-term target stipulated in the Paris Agreement.
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| 3. |
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| 4. |
- Jewell, Jessica, et al.
(author)
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Energy security under de-carbonization scenarios: An assessment framework and evaluation under different technology and policy choices
- 2014
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In: Energy Policy. - : Elsevier BV. - 1873-6777 .- 0301-4215. ; 65, s. 743-760
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- How would a low-carbon energy transformation affect energy security? This paper proposes a frame- work to evaluate energy security under long-term energy scenarios generated by integrated assessment models. Energy security is defined as low vulnerability of vital energy systems, delineated along geographic and sectoral boundaries. The proposed framework considers vulnerability as a combination of risks associated with inter-regional energy trade and resilience reflected in energy intensity and diversity of energy sources and technologies. We apply this framework to 43 scenarios generated by the MESSAGE model as part of the Global Energy Assessment, including one baseline scenario and 42 ‘low- carbon’ scenarios where the global mean temperature increase is limited to 21C over the pre-industrial level. By and large, low-carbon scenarios are associated with lower energy trade and higher diversity of energy options, especially in the transport sector. A few risks do emerge under low-carbon scenarios in the latter half of the century. They include potentially high trade in natural gas and hydrogen and low diversity of electricity sources. Trade is typically lower in scenarios which emphasize demand-side policies as well as non-tradable energy sources (nuclear and renewables) while diversity is higher in scenarios which limit the penetration of intermittent renewables.
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| 5. |
- Leduc, Sylvain, et al.
(author)
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Methanol production by gasification using a geographically explicit model
- 2009
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In: Biomass and Bioenergy. - : Elsevier BV. - 0961-9534 .- 1873-2909. ; 33:5, s. 745-751
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Methanol mixed with 15% gasoline appears to be a viable alternative energy source for the transportation sector. Produced from gasification of certified wood coming from well-managed forests, its production could be considered as sustainable and the well-to-wheel emissions can be reduced significantly. The physical flows of the entire bio-energy chain consisting of harvesting, biomass transportation, methanol production by gasification, methanol transportation, and methanol distribution to the consumers are assessed and costs are estimated for each part of the chain. A transportation model has been constructed to estimate the logistic demands of biomass supply to the processing plant and to the supply of gas station. The analysis was carried out on a case study for the geography of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It has been found that a typical optimal size for methanol production of some 130,000 m3, supplies about 100 gas stations, and the biomass supply requires on average 22,000 ha of short-rotational poplar, with an average transportation distance of biomass of some 50 km to the methanol processing plant. The methanol production costs appear to be most sensitive with respect to methanol plant efficiency, wood cost, and operating hours of the plant. In an area where biomass is spread heterogeneously, apart from the demand, the geographical position of the plant would appear to have a major impact on the final biofuel cost.
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| 6. |
- Obersteiner, Michael, 1967-, et al.
(author)
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Biomass Energy, Carbon Removaland Permanent Sequestration : A ‘Real Option’ for Managing Climate Risk
- 2001
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) calls forstabilization of greenhouse gases (GHGs) at a safe level, and it also prescribesprecautionary measures to anticipate, prevent, or minimize the causes of climate changeand mitigate their adverse effects. In order to achieve this goal, such measures should becost-effective and scientific uncertainty on threats of serious or irreversible damageshould not be used as a reason for postponing them. In this sense, the UNFCCC can beunderstood as a responsive climate management scheme that calls for precautionary andanticipatory risk management, where in a continuous sense-response mode, expectedclimate-related losses are in an uncertainty augmented analysis balanced againstadaptation and mitigation costs.In this paper we investigate a component of a wider technological portfolio of climaterisk management. In particular, we will investigate the properties of biomass-basedsequestration technologies with respect to their potential role in climate riskmanagement. We use the theory of modern asset pricing, commonly known as realoption valuation, in order to assess this technology on global and long-term scales.Biomass energy can be used to produce both carbon neutral energy carriers, e.g.,electricity and hydrogen, and at the same time offer a permanent CO2 sink by capturingcarbon from the biomass at the conversion facility and permanently storing it ingeological formations. To illustrate the long-term potential of energy-related biomassuse in combination with carbon capture and sequestration, we performed an ex postanalysis based on a representative subset of the Intergovernmental Panel on ClimateChange (IPCC) reference scenarios developed with the MESSAGE-MACRO modelingframework. The cumulative carbon emissions reduction in the 21st century may exceed450 gigatons of carbon, which represents more than 35% of the total emissions of thereference scenarios, and could lead, in cases of low shares of fossil fuel consumption, tonet removal of carbon from the atmosphere (negative emissions) before the end of thiscentury. The long-run technological potential of such a permanent sink technology islarge enough to neutralize historical fossil fuel emissions and cover a significant part ofglobal energy and raw material demand. The economic potential might turn out to besmaller, if the signposts of climate change do not require that negative emissions, as areal option, need to be exercised.The main policy conclusion is that investments in both expanding the absorptivecapacity for carbon (expanding carbon stocks) and research and development (R&D)investments for developing negative emission technologies as a viable technologycluster should not only be (socially) priced against all other mitigation technologies bysimple Net Present Value calculation (working only with the average expected loss), butaccording to a real option valuation given the full uncertainty spectrum of expected(economic) losses due to human induced climate change. The questions of how muchand when sinks have to be committed as real options for robust climate managementdepend on the properties of the climate signal and the nations’ degree of risk aversion― both are yet to be fully quantified.
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| 7. |
- van Vuuren, Detlef P., et al.
(author)
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Defining a sustainable development target space for 2030 and 2050
- 2022
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In: One Earth. - : Elsevier BV. - 2590-3330 .- 2590-3322. ; 5:2, s. 142-156
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- With the establishment of the sustainable development goals (SDGs), countries worldwide agreed to a prosperous, socially inclusive, and environmentally sustainable future for all. This ambition, however, exposes a critical gap in science-based insights, namely on how to achieve the 17 SDGs simultaneously. Quantitative goal-seeking scenario studies could help explore the needed systems' transformations. This requires a clear definition of the "target space." The 169 targets and 232 indicators used for monitoring SDG implementation cannot be used for this; they are too many, too broad, unstructured, and sometimes not formulated quantitatively. Here, we propose a streamlined set of science-based indicators and associated target values that are quantifiable and actionable to make scenario analysis meaningful, relevant, and simple enough to be transparent and communicable. The 36 targets are based on the SDGs, existing multilateral agreements, literature, and expert assessment. They include 2050 as a longer-term reference point. This target space can guide researchers in developing new sustainable development pathways.
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