Australia’s greenhouse emissions could be cut to 23% below 2004 levels by 2050 by building 11 nuclear power plants, through energy efficiency measures and by massively boosting the use of renewables, government research agency ABARE says.
The scenario, which would see the nation’s emissions peak in about 2016, would transform the way Australia generates energy. But the scale of the cuts is still far less ambitious than environment groups say is required of Australia as part of efforts to avoid dangerous climate change.
An ABARE report issued today compares an ‘enhanced technology’ scenario with a ‘reference case’ scenario and looks at the effects nationally and globally.
In the reference case, coal would be continue to be Australia’s dominant source of primary energy, generating 308 terrawatt hours (TWh) in 2050, compared to 192TWh in 2004. Gas-fired generation would more than triple from 33TWh to 107TWh.
Biomass would provide 24TWh, wind 10TWh, solar 2TWh and other renewables 10TWh.
But the picture for 2050 is very different under the enhanced technology scenario. Coal would generate only 83TWh, less than half what it generates now. Gas would nudge slightly higher than current levels to generate 36TWh. Nuclear would generate 63TWh a year, wind would generate 30TWh, biomass 21TWh, hydro 19TWh, solar 44TWh and other renewables 10TWh. P113
Thanks to massive energy efficiency improvements, Australia’s electricity generation would be about 36% below reference case levels in 2050. All new coal and gas-fired electricity plants from 2020 would use carbon capture and storage.
Key technologies delivering gains
ABARE’s enhanced technology scenario would see Australia’s first nuclear plant begin operating in 2025, with 11 plants – each with a capacity of 750MW – operating by 2050.
New coal and gas-fired plants in Australia would be operating at 66% efficiency (coal) and 75% (gas). All new coal and gas plants in nearly all OECD countries would have carbon capture and storage from 2020 and in China and India from 2035.
In the global primary aluminium sector, changes such as the widespread use of inert anodes are expected to deliver a 24% to 38% reduction in energy intensity over 2004-2050.
In the global cement sector, production energy intensity would decline from 3.1-5.6GJ/tonne of clinker in 2004 to 1.8-2.2GJ/tonne due to technologies such as fluidised bed kilns.
In the global iron and steel sector, blast furnace energy efficiency would improve from 21-34 GJ/tonne in 2004 to 12 to 17GJ/tonne in 2050. Electric arc furnaces would improve from 5.2-8.9 GJ/tonne to 2.2-2.9GJ/tonne.
Biofuels would comprise 21% of road transport fuels globally by 2050.
In the residential sector, the energy efficiency of refrigerators is expected to improve by 80% and other appliances would improve 46% (compared with 14% in the reference case).
In Australia, 45% of heating demand would be met through solar systems (compared with the reference case of 10%).
Global impacts
Applied at the global level, ABARE’s enhanced technology scenario would significantly rein in emissions growth but would not deliver the deep cuts scientists say are necessary.
ABARE says global greenhouse gas emissions would fall significantly relative to the reference case of a 148% increase above 2004 levels by 2050. But they would still rise to 36% above 2004 levels.
The majority of abatement in the short term would come through uptake of currently available energy efficient technologies. Longer term gains would come from the commercialisation and widespread deployment of currently unavailable or uncompetitive technologies.
Technology: Toward a Low Emission Future: ABARE Research Report 07.16 (ABARE, September 27, 2007)
