A future history book may well describe our current era as the period of the Climate Wars (1997-2015?). The author of that book would probably have a hard time describing the varying battles, shifting alliances, and even who was wrong and who was right. Then again, maybe all will become clear at some point in the future.
For now we have to make do with still-fresh battle reports and strategic-tactical reviews. We have a fair number on offer again this week.
To begin with, in Brussels the new European Commission is getting ready to tackle the thorny problem of decarbonising the road transport sector. Whereas the energy sector managed to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions considerably over the last decades, those from transport are still 20% above 1990 levels.
Having spoken and listened to many of the key decision-makers, our Brussels correspondent Sonja van Renssen concludes that the new Commission wants to go for 1) stricter vehicle emission standards and 2) electrification. However, it has no clue yet on what to do about biofuels - to the consternation of the big oil and car companies, which have launched a lobby campaign to get biofuels back on the agenda. Sonja’s report here.
Still, the energy sector remains the main climate battle front in Europe. The influential German think tank Agora Energiewende, which represents government, NGO’s as well as Germany industry and the energy sector, has come out with a report that offers a pretty breath-taking view of where the European energy system is going.
In an interview with Energy Post about this new study, Dimitri Pescia of Agora sums up the key messages: integration of 50% renewables in the electricy system is possible, there will be no more baseload power in Europe in 2030, there is no business case anymore for new nuclear power.
He also notes what Agora believes is the major challenge of the energy transition: if we don’t change the design of the energy market “completely”, he says, then “renewable energies will never be able to finance themselves”. You can find this hair-raising stuff here.
Agora may seem to be marching ahead of the column, but French energy producer EDF, the largest utility in Europe, is certainly taking the possibility of radical change into account. The company has produced a "technical and economic analysis of the European electricity system with 60% renewable energy”. This concludes that such a renewables revolution involves great challenges, but is not impossible.
At a conference Energy Post hosted in Brusels on 17 June, sponsored by EDF, a spokesman of the company reassured the audience that even with 60% renewables, “the lights won’t go out”. Nevertheless, a lot of issues need to be resolved for a smooth transition, says EDF. This unique EDF study is now available on our website here.
In the UK, the new Tory government has its own views about what a low-carbon future should look like. Or what it should NOT look like. According to the Conservatives, it should NOT be based on onshore wind.
The new UK secretary of energy and climate change Amber Rudd has announced that subsidies for new onshore wind projects will be halted, acknowledging that this will kill off 250 planned projects totalling 7.1 GW of capacity. Instead, the government wants to rely on offshore wind – and nuclear power. Peter Strachan and Alex Russell of Robert Gordon University in Scotland argue that this new policy – in particular the reliance on new nuclear – could prove to be a costly mistake. Article here.
In the Netherlands the government might be forced to build more wind farms. The district court in The Hague this week issued a unique ruling that may reverberate across the world: it has ordered the Dutch government to take considerably more action against climate change than it is currently doing. According to Urgenda, the NGO which started the case, this is the first time such a thing has happened in the world, and it will provide support to all other similar court cases that may be brought in other countries. Story here.
Leaving legal wrangles aside, what will the low-carbon future look like technologically? For some, the future of the energy market lies in solar-plus-storage. Decentralisation, in other words.
The solar-plus-battery faith has been given a strong boost with the recent announcement of Tesla’s new Powerwall battery. However, author Will Boisvert disagrees. He believes that “a rational energy storage scheme” will not rely on “solar systems that store during periods of high daytime demand to service somewhat higher evening demand”, but rather on “low-carbon baseload plants (including nuclear plants) that reliably store when nighttime demand is very low.”
To read Boisvert’s powerful critique of the Powerwall, click here.
Finally, as we all know, peace talks have been scheduled for December this year, as it happens not too far from Versailles. Indeed, negotiations have already started, with countries submitting their national climate plans. An interesting question is whether business should follow this negotiation process or simply await the outcome.
According to Rolf de Vos and Maarten Neelis of energy consultancy Ecofys, there are good reasons why companies would do well to inform themselves of the national plans, because they give vital information on how climate policies will develop – and what opportunities there may be in the low-carbon sector. You can read their original take on this here.
The article by De Vos and Neelis is the second post in a new blog hosted by Energy Post, the Ecofys Paris Climate Blog. Here experts from Ecofys will look at the climate policy negotiations with a particular view of what they mean for business – and how business can contribute to them.
We hope you will find our articles interesting – even if you find yourself disagreeing with them. Thanks for all your comments and shares. And stay tuned for the long hot summer ahead! There is a lot more to come.
Karel Beckman, editor-in-chief
