Quantifying operational lifetimes for coal power plants under the Paris goals

Cui, Ryna; Hultman, Nathan; Edwards, M. L.; He, Linlang; Sen, Arunava; Surana, Kavita; McJeon, Haewon; Iyer, Gokul; Patel, Pralit; Yu, Sha; Nace, Ted; Shearer, Christine

doi:10.1038/s41467-019-12618-3

Cited by 130 publications

(85 citation statements)

References 35 publications

(30 reference statements)

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“…First, a rapid transition requires early retirement of substantial coal-generation capacity while canceling newly planned coal projects. 29 , 30 China has been canceling planned coal projects since 2016 due to overcapacity and air pollution concerns, and canceled more than 130 GW of planned coal projects in 2019 alone. 30 However, by the end of 2019, about 80% of China's coal capacity was built after 2000 ( Figure 2 ).…”

Section: Current Policies and Barriersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enabling a Rapid and Just Transition away from Coal in China

Lin

Zhang

et al. 2020

One Earth

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Summary As the world's largest coal producer and consumer, China's transition from coal to cleaner energy sources is critical for achieving global decarbonization. Increasing regulations on air pollution and carbon emissions and decreasing costs of renewables drive China's transition away from coal; however, this transition also has implications for employment and social justice. Here, we assess China's current coal-transition policies, their barriers, and the potential for an accelerated transition, as well as the associated environmental, human health, and employment and social justice issues that may arise from the transition. We estimate that the most aggressive coal-transition pathway could reduce annual premature death related to coal combustion by 224,000 and reduce annual water consumption by 4.3 billion m 3 in 2050 compared with business-as-usual. We highlight knowledge gaps and conclude with policy recommendations for an integrated approach to facilitate a rapid and just transition away from coal in China.

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Section: Current Policies and Barriersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enabling a Rapid and Just Transition away from Coal in China

Lin

Zhang

et al. 2020

One Earth

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“…Note that as the estimation of stranded scale is quite sensitive to the FLH and technical lifetime (Cui et al 2019), we also included a sensitive analysis (see SI.3). The first analysis shows the results under 4000 and 3500 h of FLH, and the second analysis shows the results under 30 and 35 years of lifetime assumption.…”

Section: Estimated Scale Of Assets With Stranded Riskmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Moreover, they pointed out the importance of the power sector in decarbonizing the energy system (Tong et al 2019). Cui et al compared the existing and planned coal-based power plant development with climate targets to demonstrate that the operational lifetime of existing coal plants should be reduced to 35 and 20 years to meet the 2°C and 1.5°C targets, respectively (Cui et al 2019). With a focus on the US, Lyer et al also found that coal power plants may face the risk of being prematurely retired by modeling the low-emission development strategy with the GCAM model (Iyer et al 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Early transformation of the Chinese power sector to avoid additional coal lock-in

Wang

Chen

Bertram

et al. 2020

Environ. Res. Lett.

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Emission reduction from the coal-dominated power sector is vital for achieving China's carbon mitigation targets. Although the coal expansion has been slowed down due to the cancellation of and delay in new construction, coal-based power was responsible for over one third of China's energyrelated CO 2 emissions by 2018. Moreover, with a technical lifetime of over 30 years, current investment in coal-based power could hinder CO 2 mitigation until 2050. Therefore, it is important to examine whether the current coal-based power planning aligns with the long-term climate targets. This paper introduces China's Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) goals and an ambitious carbon budget along with global pathways well-below 2 degrees that are divided into five integrated assessment models, which are two national and three global models. We compare the models' results with bottom-up data on current capacity additions and expansion plans to examine if the NDC targets are in line with 2-degree pathways. The key findings are: 1. NDC goals alone are unlikely to lead to significant reductions in coal-based power generation. On the contrary, more plants may be built before 2030; 2. this would require an average of 187-261 TWh of annual coal-based power capacity reduction between 2030 and 2050 to achieve a 2°C compatible trajectory, which would lead to the stranding of large-scale coal-based power plants; 3. if the reduction in coal power can be brought forward to 2020, the average annual coal-based power reduction required would be 104-155 TWh from 2020 to 2050 and the emissions could peak earlier; 4. early regulations in coal-based power would require accelerated promotion of alternatives between 2020 and 2030, with nuclear, wind and solar power expected to be the most promising alternatives. By presenting the stranding risk and viability of alternatives, we suggest that both the government and enterprises should remain cautious about making new investment in coal-based power sector.

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“…In terms of the feasibility of such drastic energy system changes, existing studies have pointed out transition risks, such as carbon lock-in, stranded investment, and premature retirement relative to the expected lifetime of fossil fuelrelated infrastructure (Campiglio et al 2018;Mercure et al 2018;Seto et al 2016). At the global scale, several studies using IAMs have indicated that the lack of short-term mitigation actions would lead to premature phase-out of coal power plants and stranding of fossil fuel assets, resulting in increased stranded investment in the energy supply sectors (Bertram et al 2015;Cui et al 2019;Johnson et al 2015). At the national level, Iyer et al (2017) explicitly focused on disruptive changes between the US NDC and MCS, and quantified stranded coal capacity by 2050 using the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Stranded investment associated with rapid energy system changes under the mid-century strategy in Japan

Oshiro

Fujimori

2020

Sustain Sci

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Japan’s mid-century strategy to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 80% by 2050 requires rapid energy system changes, which may lead to stranded assets in fossil fuel-related infrastructure. Existing studies have shown that massive stranding of assets in the energy supply side is possible; few studies have involved economy-wide stranded asset analysis. In this study, we estimated stranded investments in both the energy supply and demand sectors in Japan in the context of near-term goals for 2030 and the mid-century strategy. To this end, multiple emission scenarios for Japan were assessed based on various emission reduction targets for 2030 and 2050. The results show that stranded investments in the energy supply sectors occur mainly in coal power plants without carbon capture and storage (CCS), especially in scenarios without enhanced near-term mitigation targets. Increases of stranded investment in demand sectors were observed primarily under stringent mitigation scenarios, which exceed the 80% reduction target. In particular, investment for oil and gas heating systems in the buildings sector may be stranded at levels up to $20 billion US between 2021 and 2050. We further simulated a scenario incorporating a subsidy for devices that do not use fossil fuels as a sector-specific policy; this reduced the amount of stranded investment in the buildings sector. We confirmed the benefit of enhancing near-term mitigation targets to avoid generating stranded investments. These findings support the importance of inclusive energy and climate policy design involving not only pricing of carbon emissions but also complementary cross-sector economy-wide policies.

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Quantifying operational lifetimes for coal power plants under the Paris goals

Cited by 130 publications

References 35 publications

Enabling a Rapid and Just Transition away from Coal in China

Enabling a Rapid and Just Transition away from Coal in China

Early transformation of the Chinese power sector to avoid additional coal lock-in

Stranded investment associated with rapid energy system changes under the mid-century strategy in Japan

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