4.4.1. Carbon dioxide emissions from energy supply by 2030

A few selected baseline (IEA 2006b, WEO Reference; SRES A1; SRES B2 (Table 4.1); ABARE Reference) and policy mitigation scenarios (IEA 2006b, WEO Alternative policy; ABARE Global Technology and ABARE Global Technology +CCS) out to 2030 illustrate the wide range of possible future energy-sector mixes (Figure 4.25). They give widely differing views of future energy-supply systems, the primary-energy mix and the related GHG emissions. Higher energy prices (as experienced in 2005/06), projections that they will remain high (Section 4.3.1) or current assessments of CCS deployment rates (Section 4.3.6) are not always included in the scenarios. Hence, more recent studies (for example IEA 2006b, IEA 2006d; Fisher, 2006) are perhaps more useful for evaluating future energy supply potentials, though they still vary markedly.

Figure 4.25: Indicative comparison of selected primary energy-supply baseline (reference) and policy scenarios from 2004 to 2030 and related total energy-related emissions in 2004 and 2030 (GtCO₂-eq)

Source: Based on IEA, 2006b; IPCC, 2001; Price and de la Rue du Can, 2006; Fisher, 2006.Note: The IEA (2006b) Beyond Alternative Policy scenario (not shown) depicts that energy-related emissions could be reduced to 2004 levels.

The ABARE global model, based on an original version produced for the Asia Pacific Partnership (US, Australia, Japan, China, India, Korea) (Fisher, 2006), is useful for mitigation analysis as it accounts for both higher energy prices and CCS opportunities. However, it does not separate ‘modern biomass’ from ‘other renewables’, and the modellers had also assumed that CCS would play a more significant mitigation role after 2050, rather than by the 2030 timeframe discussed here. The reference case (‘Ref’ in Figure 4.25) is a projection of key economic, energy and technology variables assuming the continuation of current or already announced future government policies and no significant shifts in climate policy. The Global Technology scenario (ABARE ‘Tech’) assumed that development and transfer of advanced energy-efficient technologies will occur at an accelerated rate compared with the reference case. Collaborative action from 2006 was assumed to affect technology development and transfer between several leading developed countries and hence lead to more rapid uptake of advanced technologies in electricity, transport and key industry sectors. The ‘Tech+CCS’ scenario assumed similar technology developments and transfer rates for electricity, transport and key industry sectors, but in addition CCS was utilized in all new coal- and gas-fired electricity generation plant from 2015 in US, Australia and Annex I countries and from 2020 in China, India and Korea.

Figure 4.26: Predicted world energy sources to meet growing demand by 2030 based on updated SRES B2 scenario.

Source: IPCC, 2001; IIASA 1998

Note: Related CO₂ emissions from coal, gas and oil are also shown, as well as resources in 2004 (see Figure 4.4) and their depletion between 2004 and 2030 (vertical bars to the left). The resource efficiency ratio by which fast-neutron technology increases the power-generation capability per tonne of natural uranium varies greatly from the OECD assessment of 30:1 (OECD, 2006b). In this diagram the ratio used is up to 240:1 (OECD, 2006c).

Table 4.6: Estimated carbon dioxide emissions from fossil-fuel use in the energy sector for 2002 and 2030 (MtCO₂ /yr).

^a WEO, 2006 (IEA 2006b, unavailable at the time of the analysis) gives total CO₂ emissions as 26,079 MtCO₂ for 2004

Source: Price and de la Rue du Can, 2006.