Integrated life-cycle assessment of electricity-supply scenarios confirms global environmental benefit of low-carbon technologies

Abstract

Decarbonization of electricity generation can support climatechange mitigation and presents an opportunity to address pollution resulting from fossil-fuel combustion. Generally, renewable technologies require higher initial investments in infrastructure than fossil-based power systems. To assess the tradeoffs of increased up-front emissions and reduced operational emissions, we present, to our knowledge, the first global, integrated lifecycle assessment (LCA) of long-term, wide-scale implementation of electricity generation from renewable sources (i.e., photovoltaic and solar thermal, wind, and hydropower) and of carbon dioxide capture and storage for fossil power generation. We compare emissions causing particulate matter exposure, freshwater ecotoxicity, freshwater eutrophication, and climate change for the climate-change-mitigation (BLUE Map) and business-as-usual (Baseline) scenarios of the International Energy Agency up to 2050. We use a vintage stock model to conduct an LCA of newly installed capacity year-by-year for each region, thus accounting for changes in the energy mix used to manufacture future power plants. Under the Baseline scenario, emissions of air and water pollutants more than double whereas the low-carbon technologies introduced in the BLUE Map scenario allow a doubling of electricity supply while stabilizing or even reducing pollution. Material requirements per unit generation for low-carbon technologies can be higher than for conventional fossil generation: 11-40 times more copper for photovoltaic systems and 6-14 times more iron for wind power plants. However, only two years of current global copper and one year of iron production will suffice to build a low-carbon energy system capable of supplying the world's electricity needs in 2050.land use | climate-change mitigation | air pollution | multiregional input-output | CO 2 capture and storage

Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment: What Is It and What Are Its Challenges?

“…The key challenge is to effectively combine backcasting LCSA 5 (BLCSA; Heijungs et al 2014 ) with forecasting LCSA (FLCSA) approaches (e.g. Hertwich et al 2014 ;Koning et al 2015 ) and eventually also product LCA (CLCA as well as ALCA) in such a way that policies and transitions towards a more sustainable future can be properly supported and monitored. 6 All our life cycle tools should be accompanied with proper ways of dealing with uncertainties of data, methodological choices, assumptions and scenarios and pref-5 Heijungs et al ( 2014 ) defi ned backcasting LCSA as exploring ways, in a life cycle perspective, to stay within normatively defi ned sustainability levels (e.g.…”

“…For policy development, we need to analyse all possible direct and indirect consequences of potential policy options using life cycle-based scenario analysis for which CLCA, BLCSA, FLCSA and other scenariobased life cycle approaches (e.g. Spielmann et al 2005 ;Hertwich et al 2014 ;Koning et al 2015 ) are best suited. For monitoring existing, accepted policies, we need clear black and white answers and no scenario-based ranges of answers; for this, ALCA seems better suited.…”

“…Nevertheless, several references mention (e.g. Cinelli et al 2013 ;Sala et al 2013b ;Zamagni 2012 ;Zamagni et al 2013 ;Pesonen and Horn 2013 ;Kucukvar and Tatari 2013 ;Kucukvar et al 2014a , b ) and some even address (Hertwich et al 2014 ) typical 'deepening' topics such as the need for comprehensive uncertainty assessment and methods for dealing with rebound effects. But, again, these references were excluded from Table 3.1 and Annex 1 due to the limitations of our bibliometric analysis (see above).…”

Exploring the macro-scale CO2 mitigation potential of photovoltaics and wind energy in Europe's energy transition

“…The life-cycle environmental benefits of renewable energy technologies at the micro-level have been largely documented and compared to those of other technologies (Hertwich et al, 2015;Masanet et al, 2013;Nugent and Sovacool, 2014). Nevertheless, these findings do not necessarily reflect the environmental performance of these technologies from a macro-level perspective, i.e.…”

Comparing mineral and fossil surplus costs of renewable and non-renewable electricity production

“…accelerated shift toward renewable (low-carbon) energy technologies can be observed (International Energy Agency 2015). The large-scale implementation of renewable energy technologies, however, comes with increased use of mineral resources, such as copper for photovoltaic systems and iron for wind power plants (Hertwich et al 2014;Kleijn et al 2011;Pehlken et al 2017).…”