A review of 100% renewable energy scenarios on islands

Abstract

Globally, more than 740 million people live on islands which are often seen as ideal environments for the development of renewable energy systems. Hereby, they play the role to demonstrate technical solutions as well as political transition pathways of energy systems to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The growing number of articles on 100% renewable energy systems on islands is analyzed with a focus on technical solutions for transition pathways. Since the first “100% renewable energy systems on islands”‐article in a scientific journal in 2004, 97 articles handling 100% renewable energy systems on small islands were published and are reviewed in this article. In addition, a review on 100% renewable energy systems on bigger island states is added. Results underline that solar PV as well as wind are the main technologies regarding 100% RES on islands. Not only for the use of biomass but for all RES area limitation on islands needs to be taken more seriously, based on full energy system studies and respective area demand. Furthermore, it is shown that there is still not the same common sense in the design approach including and starting at the energy needs as well as on multi‐sectoral approach. The consideration of maritime transport, aviation, cooling demands, and water systems beyond seawater desalination is only poorly considered in existing studies. Future research should also focus on developing pathways to transform the existing conventional infrastructure stepwise into a fully renewable system regarding also the interconnections with the mainland and neighboring islands. This article is categorized under: Policy and Economics > Green Economics and Financing Energy Systems Economics > Economics and Policy Energy Systems Analysis > Economics and Policy Energy Systems Analysis > Systems and Infrastructure

On the History and Future of 100% Renewable Energy Systems Research

“…This has improved only marginally with 72% of about 666 known 100% RE system analysis articles at the end of 2021. Many of the known 100% RE system analyses for the Global South cover off-grid analyses of individual villages or smaller regions or smaller islands [436], such as the very well investigated La Réunion [437], Galapagos [438] or Canary Islands [126], so that the relative share of countrylevel analyses are substantially smaller. We apply the definition of the Global South according to Dados and Connell [439].…”

Offshore versus onshore: The underestimated impact of onshore wind and solar photovoltaics for the energy transition of the British Isles

“…As of today, a large number of studies, summarised in [8][9][10], indicate that a 100% RE system can be achieved globally at low cost. Hundreds of studies show the benefit of 100% RE systems [10,11], which is confirmed for the UK and Ireland by Meschede et al [12].…”

Review on 100% Renewable Energy System Analyses—A Bibliometric Perspective

“…state or region; city, village or off-grid; islands). Islands are researched globally with 65 publications identified until mid-2021, with almost 100 articles by mid-2022 [60]; however, most of the island states in the Caribbean and the Pacific are still not researched as shown in Table 1.…”

“…The roughly 100 articles on 100% RE systems on islands are reviewed in more detail [60], along with further review articles with an island focus [61], [62], [63], [64], [65].…”

“…The second most linked topic is (2) 'Energy System', which is interesting, since the overarching theme of the entire research field should be (2) 'Energy System'; however, the basis of the future 100% RE system, the (1) 'Power System' shows an even higher probability distribution, suggesting that it may also be more researched. Interestingly, islands research appeared as a topic, presumably because 12% of the total articles investigated the 100% RE system transition on island, which is increasingly well reviewed [60], [61], [62], [63], [64], [65]. The other cluster is (8) 'Transition' and (9) 'Heat Integration.'…”