Prospective Models of Society’s Future Metabolism: What Industrial Ecology Has to Contribute

Pauliuk, Stefan; Hertwich, Edgar G.

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-20571-7_2

Cited by 25 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 69 publications

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“…These approaches share a common origin, and their formal differentiation is still being debated within the LCA community (Bjørn et al. ; Pauliuk and Hertwich ). It is traditionally acknowledged that ALCA and CLCA aim to answer different questions: “What environmental impact can be attributed to product X?” and “what environmental impact is product X responsible for?” (Bjørn et al.…”

Section: Methodsologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…approaches exist in LCA (Earles and Halog 2011): ALCA and CLCA. These approaches share a common origin, and their formal differentiation is still being debated within the LCA community (Bjørn et al 2017;Pauliuk and Hertwich 2016). It is traditionally acknowledged that ALCA and CLCA aim to answer different questions: "What environmental impact can be attributed to product X?"…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Integrating Batteries in the Future Swiss Electricity Supply System: A Consequential Environmental Assessment

Vandepaer

Cloutier

Bauer

et al. 2018

J of Industrial Ecology

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Summary Stationary batteries are projected to play a role in the electricity system of Switzerland after 2030. By enabling the integration of surplus production from intermittent renewables, energy storage units displace electricity production from different sources and potentially create environmental benefits. Nevertheless, batteries can also cause substantial environmental impacts during their manufacturing process and through the extraction of raw materials. A prospective consequential life cycle assessment (LCA) of lithium metal polymer and lithium‐ion stationary batteries is undertaken to quantify potential environmental benefits and drawbacks. Projections are integrated into the LCA model: Energy scenarios are used to obtain marginal electricity supply mixes, and projections about the battery performances and the recycling process are sourced from the literature. The roles of key parameters and methodological choices in the results are systematically investigated. The results demonstrate that the displacement of marginal electricity sources determines the environmental implications of using batteries. In the reference scenario representing current policy, the displaced electricity mix is dominated by natural gas combined cycle units. In this scenario, the use of batteries generates environmental benefits in 12 of the 16 impact categories assessed. Nevertheless, there is a significant reduction in achievable environmental benefits when batteries are integrated into the power supply system in a low‐carbon scenario because the marginal electricity production, displaced using batteries, already has a reduced environmental impact. The direct impacts of batteries mainly originate from upstream manufacturing processes, which consume electricity and mining activities related to the extraction of materials such as copper and bauxite.

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Section: Methodsologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrating Batteries in the Future Swiss Electricity Supply System: A Consequential Environmental Assessment

Vandepaer

Cloutier

Bauer

et al. 2018

J of Industrial Ecology

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“…It has been applied to steel (Hatayama et al 2010;Pauliuk et al 2013) and aluminum (Liu et al 2012). The approach was refined to allow for the study of critical materials ), but it has not yet been applied to potentially critical metals on the global scale.…”

Section: Existing Approaches To Estimate Future Metal Flows and Resoumentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Regional resource scarcity, regional production capacity, regional policies, and international political relations strongly influence future availability and trade patterns for critical materials (European Commission 2010). To anticipate possible future development, one needs prospective assessment of the anthropogenic cycles of specialty metals (Pauliuk and Hertwich 2015), without attempting to predict the future. A scenario analysis of future supply of critical metals is a more modest and scientific approach than a prediction; it enables researchers and policy makers to study the consequences of future economic development on metal reserves and possible futures and supply shortages in different regions.…”

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confidence: 99%

Matching global cobalt demand under different scenarios for co-production and mining attractiveness

Tisserant

Pauliuk

2016

Economic Structures

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Almost all elements of the periodic table are used in modern technology, especially for renewable energy and communication technologies. Graedel et al. assessed the AbstractMany new and efficient technologies require 'critical metals' to function. These metals are often extracted as by-product of another metal, and their future supply is therefore dependent on mining developments of the host metal. Supply of critical metals can also be constrained because of political instability, discouraging mining policies, or trade restrictions. Scenario analyses of future metal supply that take these factors into account would provide policy makers with information about possible supply shortages. We provide a scenario analysis for demand and supply of cobalt, a potentially critical metal mainly used not only in high performance alloys but also in lithium-ion batteries and catalysts. Cobalt is mainly extracted as by-product of copper and nickel.A multiregional input-output (MRIO) model for 20 world regions and 163 commodities was built from the EXIOBASE v2.2.0 multiregional supply and use table with the commodity technology construct. This MRIO model was hybridized by disaggregating cobalt flows from the nonferrous metal sector. Future cobalt demand in different world regions from 2007 to 2050 was then estimated, assuming region-and sector-specific GDP growth, constant technology, and constant background import shares. A dynamic stock model of regional reserves for seven different types of copper, cobalt, and nickel resources, augmented with optimization-based region-specific mining capacity estimates, was used to determine future cobalt supply. The investment attractiveness index developed by the Fraser Institute specifically for mining industry entered the optimization routine as a measure of the regional attractiveness of mining.The baseline scenario shows no cobalt supply constraints over the considered time period 2007-2050, and recovering about 60 % of cobalt content of the copper and nickel ore flows would be sufficient to match global cobalt demand. When simulating a hypothetical sudden supply dropout in Africa during the period 2020-2035, we found that shortages in cobalt supply might occur in such scenarios.

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“…Their work revealed that LCA metrics carry crucial information that needs to be considered by both energy system modelers and climate policy makers. Currently, life cycle metrics are rarely considered in integrated assessment models (Pauliuk and Hertwich 2016;Pauliuk et al 2017), although some studies aim to cover this gap for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (Daly et al 2015;Pehl et al 2017;McDowall et al 2018) and for other life cycle impacts (Arvesen et al 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Closing the TIMES Integrated Assessment Model (TIAM‐FR) Raw Materials Gap with Life Cycle Inventories

Boubault

Kang

Mäızi

2018

J of Industrial Ecology

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Summary Integrated assessment models are in general not constrained by mineral resource supply. In this paper, we introduce a material accounting method as a first step toward addressing the raw materials gap in the TIMES integrated assessment model (TIAM‐FR version). The method consists of attributing process‐based life cycle inventories (LCIs) taken from the ecoinvent 3.3 database to the TIAM‐FR technology processes constituting the global energy system. We demonstrate the method performing a prospective exercise on the electricity‐generating sector in a second shared socioeconomic pathway (SSP2) baseline scenario on the 2010–2100 time horizon. We start by disaggregating the LCIs into three separate life phases (construction, operation, and decommissioning) and coupling them to their respective TIAM‐FR electric outputs (new capacities, electricity production, and end‐of‐life capacities) in order to estimate the annual mineral resource requirements. Prospective uses of fossil fuels and metallic and nonmetallic mineral resources are quantified dynamically at the life phase and regional levels (15 world regions). The construction of hydropower, solar power, and wind power plants generate increasing use of metallic and nonmetallic mineral resources in successive peak and valley periods. However, the use of fossil fuels is much higher than the use of mineral resources all along the horizon. Finally, we evaluate how sensitive the global material use is to the allocation of a share of infrastructure activities to the decommissioning phase. This approach could be extended to other integrated assessment models and possibly other energy sectors.

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Prospective Models of Society’s Future Metabolism: What Industrial Ecology Has to Contribute

Cited by 25 publications

References 69 publications

Integrating Batteries in the Future Swiss Electricity Supply System: A Consequential Environmental Assessment

Integrating Batteries in the Future Swiss Electricity Supply System: A Consequential Environmental Assessment

Matching global cobalt demand under different scenarios for co-production and mining attractiveness

Closing the TIMES Integrated Assessment Model (TIAM‐FR) Raw Materials Gap with Life Cycle Inventories

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