Immediate actions on coal phaseout enable a just low-carbon transition in China’s power sector

Zhang, Xiaoli; Cui, Xueqin; Li, Bo; Hidalgo-Gonzalez, Patricia; Kammen, Daniel M.; Zou, Jixing; Wang, Ke

doi:10.1016/j.apenergy.2021.118401

Cited by 43 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 38 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Our results for wind and solar installed capacities are similar to studies that assumed recent cost projections for these technologies [26], but they are greater than others that imposed limitations on the growth of manufacturing capacities [32]. Compared to the employment effects in our study, the estimate from Zhang et al [7] is 40% lower than ours due to the omission of the indirect employment impacts from a life-cycle perspective (table S10), and the estimate from Zhou et al [9] is 60% lower than ours due to the omission of the private sector employment (table S11). Similarly, our estimates of premature deaths in 2020 under the Reference scenario are lower than those of other studies because of higher shares of clean energy in 2020 and our assumption that the emission standards have perfect compliance (table S17) [3].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Regional disparities in health and employment outcomes of China’s transition to a low-carbon electricity system

Yang,

Luo,

et al. 2024

Environ. Res.: Energy

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Understanding the costs and the spatial distribution of health and employment outcomes of low-carbon electricity pathways is critical to enable an equitable transition. We integrate an electricity system planning model (GridPath), a health impact model (InMAP), and a multiregional input-output model to quantify China’s provincial-level impacts of electricity system decarbonization on costs, health outcomes, employment, and labor compensation. We find that even without specific CO2 constraints, declining renewable energy and storage costs enable a 26% decline in CO2 emissions in 2040 compared to 2020 under the Reference scenario. Compared to the Reference scenario, pursuing 2ºC and 1.5ºC compatible carbon emission targets (85% and 99% decrease in 2040 CO2 emissions relative to 2020 levels, respectively) reduces air pollution-related premature deaths from electricity generation over 2020-2040 by 51% and 63%, but substantially increases annual average costs per unit of electricity demand in 2040 (21% and 39%, respectively). While the 2ºC pathway leads to a 3% increase in electricity sector-related net labor compensation, the 1.5ºC pathway results in a 19% increase in labor compensation driven by greater renewable energy deployment. Although disparities in health impacts across provinces narrow as fossil fuels phase out, disparities in labor compensation widen with wealthier East Coast provinces gaining the most in labor compensation because of materials and equipment manufacturing, and offshore wind deployment.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Regional disparities in health and employment outcomes of China’s transition to a low-carbon electricity system

Yang,

Luo,

et al. 2024

Environ. Res.: Energy

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In terms of domestic ows, there are some opportunities for funding particularly in China. The country mobilized domestic funding to support re-employment of workers in heavy industries who lost jobs due to overcapacity 43,44 .…”

Section: Building a Database Of Compensation Policies For Coal Phase-outmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In terms of domestic flows, there are some opportunities for funding particularly in China. The country mobilized domestic funding to support re-employment of workers in heavy industries who lost jobs due to overcapacity 43,44 . And there may also be potential to mobilize funding through cutting coal subsidies (Figure 3, Supplementary Figure 3), which in China are higher than tax revenues 45 , but still far smaller than the required amounts for compensation (Supplementary Figure 3).…”

Section: Compensation Consistent With Carbon Prices and Proportional ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Socio-political cost of accelerating coal phase-out

Nacke

Vinichenko

Cherp

et al. 2023

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

While macroeconomic models highlight rapid coal phase-out as an urgent climate mitigation measure, its socio-political feasibility is unclear. The negative impacts of coal phase-out for companies, workers and coal-dependent regions, and the unequal global distribution of the coal phase-out burden has triggered resistance and calls for just transitions. Here, we construct a database of domestic and international just transition policies and partnerships that compensate affected actors of coal phase-outs. By comparing coal phase-out in countries which have compensation plans with those that don’t, we show that compensation policies are essential to realizing premature retirement of coal. The cost we estimate associated with these policies clarifies the financial cost of making coal phase-out politically feasible. We find that compensation costs are proportional to avoided emissions resulting from coal phase-out and are generally consistent with recent carbon prices. We find that the cost of implementing similar compensation policies in case of 1.5°C -consistent coal phase-out for China and India is 17 times higher than all existing compensation, and roughly comparable to global Official Development Assistance in 2021. We show that in the case of coal phase-out, political will and social acceptance have a tangible economic component which should be factored in to assessing the feasibility of achieving climate targets.

show abstract

“…Within the United States, Patrizio et al (2018) quantify employment changes associated with mitigating coal-fired emissions through heat rate improvements, replacement with a natural gas plant, co-firing with forest residues, retrofit with carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), or retrofit with CCS and co-firing with biomass. Outside the United States, studies have quantified employment shifts from replacing coal plants with wind and solar power in Europe (Kamidelivand et al, 2018), India (Sharma and Banerjee, 2021), China (Zhang et al, 2022), and globally (Pai et al, 2021).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The costs of replacing coal plant jobs with local instead of distant wind and solar jobs across the United States

et al. 2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Immediate actions on coal phaseout enable a just low-carbon transition in China’s power sector

Cited by 43 publications

References 38 publications

Regional disparities in health and employment outcomes of China’s transition to a low-carbon electricity system

Regional disparities in health and employment outcomes of China’s transition to a low-carbon electricity system

Socio-political cost of accelerating coal phase-out

The costs of replacing coal plant jobs with local instead of distant wind and solar jobs across the United States

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About