Betting on negative emissions

Fuss, Sabine; Canadell, Josep G.; Peters, Glen P.; Tavoni, Massimo; Andrew, Robbie M.; Ciais, Philippe; Jackson, Robert B.; Jones, Chris D.; Kraxner, Florian; Nakićenović, N.; Quéré, Corinne Le; Raupach, Michael; Sharifi, Ayyoob; Smith, Pete; Yamagata, Yoshiki

doi:10.1038/nclimate2392

Cited by 932 publications

(688 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…In most modelled scenarios that limit warming to 2 °C, several gigatonnes of carbon dioxide have to be extracted and safely stored each year 1 . For more ambitious targets, tens of gigatonnes per year must be removed 2 .…”

Section: Front-runnersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods

Williamson

2016

Nature

254

136

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Section: Front-runnersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods

Williamson

2016

Nature

254

136

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“…Unless national electricity demand increases significantly beyond government forecasts, the country's current coal proposals will likely lead to either more underused or "stranded" coal plants, and/or lock-out of lower carbon and potentially less costly electricity sources [Unruh, 2000]. In China, coal overcapacity and declining power demand has led the central government to suspend indefinitely over 100 GW of coal projects in January 2017, including coal plants that were already well under construction, with more suspensions expected [Forsythe, 2017].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Future CO₂ emissions and electricity generation from proposed coal‐fired power plants in India

Shearer¹,

2017

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With its growing population, industrializing economy, and large coal reserves, India represents a critical unknown in global projections of future CO2 emissions. Here, we assess proposed construction of coal‐fired power plants in India and evaluate their implications for future emissions and energy production in the country. As of mid‐2016, 243 gigawatts (GW) of coal‐fired generating capacity are under development in India, including 65 GW under construction and an additional 178 GW proposed. These under‐development plants would increase the coal capacity of India's power sector by 123% and, when combined with the country's goal to produce at least 40% of its power from non‐fossil sources by 2030, exceed the country's projected future electricity demand. The current proposals for new coal‐fired plants could therefore either “strand” fossil energy assets (i.e., force them to retire early or else operate at very low capacity factors) and/or ensure that the goal is not met by “locking‐out” new, low‐carbon energy infrastructure. Similarly, future emissions from the proposed coal plants would also exceed the country's climate commitment to reduce its 2005 emissions intensity 33% to 35% by 2030, which—when combined with the commitments of all other countries—is itself not yet ambitious enough to meet the international goal of holding warming well below 2°C relative to the pre‐industrial era.

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“…To begin with, geoengineering, like all purely technical solutions, is open to the criticism that it ignores the power relations that inevitably go hand in hand with any particular technology (Baskin 2015). At a purely technical level, not only is the precautionary principle thrown to the wind, but even in the case of a less radical technology, like bio-energy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS), it is maintained that there are several areas in which our knowledge is simply inadequate to warrant the use of such technology (Fuss et al 2014). The same is true of iron fertilization of oceans to sequester more CO 2 (Powell 2008).…”

Section: The Case Against Geoengineeringmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geoengineering: neither economical, nor ethical—a risk–reward nexus analysis of carbon dioxide removal

Faran

Olsson

2018

Int Environ Agreements

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This article addresses a central debate in combatting climate change: whether we should focus on reducing CO 2 emissions or on removing the emitted CO 2 from the atmosphere. We favor the former by arguing against the economic viability of the carbon dioxide removal (CDR) branch of geoengineering. This is of course not a question of either or, but we argue that the perception of CDR as a viable option reduces the willingness to reduce CO 2 emissions. Using the recently developed approach of risk-reward nexus (RRN) in the economics of innovation, we question the economic viability of CDR. The main argument is simple: if one uses the new framework of RRN in evaluating the innovations involved in the CDR branch of geoengineering, not only does one include more areas of risk but also one has to consider a broader base for distributing the rewards. Consequently, from RRN's point of view, it would be less likely to find investing in CDR economically viable for the investor firms. Although the core argument of the paper concerns the economics of CDR, in a final section the paper tries to show that the economic argument has also ethical implications against relying on CDR.

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Betting on negative emissions

Cited by 932 publications

References 16 publications

Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods

Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods

Future CO₂ emissions and electricity generation from proposed coal‐fired power plants in India

Geoengineering: neither economical, nor ethical—a risk–reward nexus analysis of carbon dioxide removal

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Betting on negative emissions

Cited by 932 publications

References 16 publications

Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods

Emissions reduction: Scrutinize CO2 removal methods

Future CO2 emissions and electricity generation from proposed coal‐fired power plants in India

Geoengineering: neither economical, nor ethical—a risk–reward nexus analysis of carbon dioxide removal

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About

Future CO₂ emissions and electricity generation from proposed coal‐fired power plants in India