To the Point
Researchers quantify emissions reductions associated with the deployment of key mitigation technologies. The study evaluates 108 countries generating gas-fired electricity. Implementing methane abatement, carbon capture and storage (CCS), and increasing power plant efficiencies could result in reducing emissions by 70% and 71% over 20 and 100-year timelines.
Abbreviations
- CCS: Carbon capture and storage
- GHG: Greenhouse gas
- GWP: Global warming potential
- LNG: Liquefied natural gas
- T&D: Transmission and distribution
What’s the problem with natural gas as a bridge fuel?
REMINDER: Paris agreement goals are to reduce emissions by 45% by 2030 and achieve net-zero by 2050
Global net-zero emissions by 2050 is a path that will get us to well below 2 °C from preindustrial levels.
What seem to be the options? Investments could be made in renewables and not the coal-to-gas transition. This would help with getting to net-zero faster but may lead to increased emissions in the short-term. Which strategy ultimately gets us to the net-zero target sooner is going to rely heavily on mitigation efforts.
Mitigation
- Carbon capture and storage (CCS)
- Reduce methane emissions
- Increasing power plant efficiencies
- Reducing electricity losses in transmission and distribution (T&D)
- Electricity and heat generation account for over 40% of Global CO2 emissions
- Short- to medium-term replacement of coal with natural gas can help with power-sector emissions
- Long-term investments could delay the transition to net-zero emissions beyond the Paris agreement goals
Results
- A life cycle approach was taken to assess country-level emissions for the 108 countries generating gas-fired electricity.
- Power-plant efficiency is the primary contributor to variability in emission intensity
- Countries with the highest power-plant efficiencies had the lowest emissions
- LNG was proven to be the most emissions-intensive transportation method with on average 5.4 times higher intensity than international pipeline transport and 98 times higher than domestic pipeline transport
- Electricity generation on average accounts for 70% of emissions across all countries
- In 2017, life cycle emissions from gas-fired power accounted for 10% of the 37 GtCO2e global energy-related GHG emissions
Mitigation Opportunities
- Key mitigation measures include
- Methane abatement
- Efficiency upgrades
- Carbon capture and storage (CCS)
- CCS has the potential to reduce yearly global emissions by 45%
- Methane abatement has the potential to reduce yearly global emissions by 4.8% and 14% when considering the 20 year and 100 year global warming potential (GWP) of methane
- Global emissions could be reduced by 70%-71% on the 20-year and 100-year timelines by implementing methane abatement, increased efficiencies, and CCS
Natural Gas As A Transition Fuel
- Through the mitigation efforts discussed above, it is estimated that 46.2 GtCO2e and 69.8 GtCO2e can be avoided by the 2050 and 2035, respectively
- In order to limit global warming to 1.5 °C, cumulative emissions through 2050 must be limited to 440 GtCO2e
- In order for natural gas to succeed as a bridge fuel, total emissions from all sources must not exceed the 440 GtCO2e limit
- For the 2050 and 2035 scenarios, natural gas emissions represent 11% and 16% of the overall carbon budget
- The United States and Russia account for 26% of the total global mitigated emissions
Opinion
This of course is not news but the obvious mitigation effort all countries need to take is methane abatement. Startups like SeekOps are leading the industry in providing affordable solutions to detect and locate methane emissions.
There also seems to be an incredible opportunity on the CCS front. Startups like Carbfix have the potential to dramatically reduce the cost of CCS. This could be a powerfully effective mitigation strategy for countries that have to rely on gas-generated power for decades to come due to limited resources for investment in renewables.
