Key Takeaways

• Resilience planning is an extension of existing programs and partnerships.
• Businesses respond to city leadership.
• Businesses respond to data.
• ‘Business’ is not a monolith.
• Innovative financing can help promote collaboration.

The post Guide to Public-Private Collaboration on City Climate Resilience Planning appeared first on Center for Climate and Energy Solutions.

Key Takeaways

• Climate change is causing stronger storms that could mean more power outages unless communities prepare.
• Local government strategies to reduce the likelihood and impact of power outages include hardening distribution systems, diversifying production and storage, improving energy efficiency and emergency planning.
• Local resilience strategies often provide co-benefits, such as reduced disaster losses, lowered greenhouse gas emissions, improved public health, and better air quality.
• Cities should consider comprehensive resilience strategies as New Orleans has done through electricity system hardening, microgrids, efficiency programs for homes and businesses, and improved hurricane preparedness communication.

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This is one in a series of briefs prepared as part of C2ES’s Climate Innovation 2050 initiative, which brings together leading companies to examine potential pathways toward substantially decarbonizing the U.S. economy. Other briefs focus on Agriculture & Forestry, Buildings, Oil & Gas, Manufacturing, and Power Generation. (Note: Full citations to supporting materials can be found in the pdf version of this brief.)

This brief provides an overview of emissions trends and projections, and of decarbonization challenges and opportunities, in the U.S. transportation sector. Key points include:

• Since 2016, transportation has been the biggest direct source of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. Most of the sector’s emissions come from road transport, which derives over 90 percent of its energy from petroleum.
• Transportation emissions have edged up in recent years but are projected to decline until 2035 as improved vehicle efficiency more than offsets rising air travel. Emissions are then projected to rise through 2050 as increases in vehicle miles traveled outpace efficiency gains.
• Major decarbonization pathways for transportation include switching to lower-carbon fuels, improving vehicle efficiency, and improving system-wide efficiency, including through the use of autonomous vehicles and vehicle sharing. Other opportunities include mode switching and new modes like high-speed rail.
• Major challenges in scaling up non-petroleum-based fuels such as natural gas, biofuels, hydrogen, and electricity are ensuring that their production does not indirectly increase emissions, and creating the necessary infrastructure. Additional challenges include the higher cost and lower energy density of non-petroleum-based fuels. Electric vehicles are currently projected to grow from 4 percent to 19 percent of market share by 2050, and a number of major automakers plan to electrify their entire offerings by the mid-2020s.

Overview

The transportation sector moves goods and people across the United States via road, rail, ship, and airplane. It employs nearly 10 million people, and accounted for 8.9 percent of U.S. GDP in 2015. Petroleum supplies more than 90 percent of the sector’s energy, and essentially all of its greenhouse gas emissions come from the combustion of gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, or other petroleum liquids. Other energy sources like natural gas, ethanol, biofuels, hydrogen, and electricity comprise small fractions of today’s transportation energy supply.

The subsector producing, by far, the greatest emissions is on-road transportation, which includes passenger cars, light-duty trucks (e.g., vans and SUVs), medium- and heavy-duty trucks, buses, and motorcycles (Figure 1). However, emissions from aviation grew more rapidly in 2017 than any other subsector, offsetting roughly 40 percent of the decline in emissions from coal use in electric power generation for the year.

Transportation “output” tends to be measured in usage: vehicle miles traveled (VMT) for cars and trucks, passenger miles travelled for transit, airplanes, and other passenger vehicles, and ton miles for freight. This metric reflects total activity in the transportation sector and directly relates to sector emissions.

Emissions Trends and Projections

As of 2016, transportation is the United States’ largest direct source of greenhouse gases (industry ranks higher when counting both its direct and indirect emissions). Most transportation emissions are carbon dioxide (CO₂) produced by the combustion of fossil fuels. Methane and nitrous oxide are also emitted as by-products of combustion. Cooling systems, which are commonly used for both air conditioning and refrigerated transport of goods, also emit hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs).

Total transportation sector emissions rose 29 percent from 1990 to 2005, driven largely by VMT increases in road transport. With continued improvements in vehicle efficiency, sector emissions fell 9.7 percent from their 2005 peak by 2015. In recent years, sector emissions have been increasing, due largely to increased passenger-vehicle VMT. Having averaged 2.3 percent a year from 1990 to 2005, and then slowing to less than 1 percent a year, VMT growth rebounded to 2.3 percent in 2015 and grew to 3.6 percent in 2016. Another key driver of emissions trends is the increased market share of less fuel-efficient light trucks, up from 20 percent in model years 1975–1982 to 45 percent in 2016.

Other subsectors have shown mixed trends. Medium- and heavy-duty trucks experienced a 95 percent increase in VMT between 1990 and 2015, leading to a 78 percent increase in CO₂ emissions. CO₂ emissions from domestic aviation increased by 8 percent over the same period, while emissions from international flights leaving the U.S. increased by 88.8 percent. By contrast, CO₂ emissions from international shipping from the U.S. have decreased 40.6 percent since 1990.

The Energy Information Agency’s 2018 Annual Energy Outlook (AEO) projects a 13.6 percent reduction in total transportation sector CO₂ emissions, including indirect emissions from electricity used in transportation, between 2015 and 2035. Steadily rising usage in all modes is outweighed by the improving efficiency of on-road vehicles, resulting in net emission reductions. (EIA’s analysis assumes that current federal and state vehicle emissions standards will remain in place; however, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has begun steps to relax these standards.) After 2030, the sector’s CO₂ emissions are projected to rebound, rising 8.2 percent by 2050, as increasing usage across modes outpaces increasing fuel efficiency of vehicles. Sales of electrified vehicles (including all-electric, plug-in hybrid, and hybrid) are projected to increase from 4 percent of market share in 2017 to 19 percent in 2050.

VMT associated with freight transportation by trucks is expected to increase almost 50 percent from 2017 to 2050 because of increased economic activity. Ton miles for freight transportation via rail are projected to increase 27 percent from 2017 to 2050 as industrial output increases.

Domestically originating air travel (domestic and international flights) is projected to double by 2050, increasing consumption of jet fuel by 64 percent despite advances in energy efficiency for aircraft. The International Civil Aviation Organization has established a global market-based-mechanism – the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation, or CORSIA – to achieve carbon-neutral growth in international aviation after 2020. The International Maritime Organization recently set a goal of reducing carbon emissions from international shipping 50% below 2008 levels by 2050.

Decarbonization Opportunities and Challenges

Potential decarbonization pathways in the transportation sector include the use of lower-carbon fuels, improved vehicle efficiency, improved system-wide efficiency, and mode switching (e.g., from passenger vehicles to mass transit or from air to high-speed rail).  While each of these strategies applies to some degree across all transportation modes, the primary focus here is on-road transportation, which accounts for three-quarters of the sector’s emissions

Zero-Carbon Fuels

Since essentially all transportation sector emissions come from the combustion of petroleum, substitute fuels could, in theory, bring sector emissions to zero. A variety of substitutes are in use today, including ethanol, natural gas, biofuels, hydrogen, and electricity. With some exceptions, current petroleum substitutes have direct or indirect emissions, so alternate production methodologies or primary energy sources will need to be developed at scale to achieve deep reductions. The carbon benefits of alternative fuels will depend on whether they can be derived from non-emitting sources.

Electricity can potentially be used to fuel any class of road vehicle and, when coupled with decarbonization of the power sector, has the potential to deliver deep sector reductions. Electric vehicles could, in turn, contribute to decarbonization of the power sector by providing mobile storage to help integrate intermittent electricity sources like wind and solar. Challenges to full electrification include upfront costs of batteries and lack of charging infrastructure. Several countries, including the United Kingdom, China, and France, have announced bans on sales of cars and trucks that use petroleum, beginning in 2040. At the same time, major automakers like GM, Toyota, and Volvo have announced plans to electrify their entire offerings by the mid-2020s.

Hydrogen (or other) fuel cells also use electricity to drive a motor, but the electricity is generated on-board in the fuel cell, instead of being stored in a battery. Hydrogen can be generated by electrolysis of water, potentially providing a renewable fuel source, but most hydrogen used in fuel cells today is derived from natural gas. Future pathways could take advantage of surplus electricity from renewables to generate hydrogen (or ammonia, which can be more easily transported and readily converted back to hydrogen for use in fuel cells). Finding such uses for surplus renewable energy also could improve the economics of power sector decarbonization.

A critical challenge to switching to electricity (including fuel cells) is the modification, or outright replacement, of existing transportation infrastructure like gas stations. This transition could be eased by new technologies such as faster charging devices, cheaper batteries with longer range, or fuel cells that could operate on a broader variety of fuels.

Some modes, like air transportation, have unique constraints on energy density and transportability that may limit the use of electricity as an alternative. Biofuels have great potential in these cases, though only if their production does not result in deforestation or displacing crops, both of which would increase emissions from land use. Currently, most aviation biofuel is produced from used cooking oils; an alternative fuel at-scale would likely require some sort of grass- or wood-derived production. An attractive feature of many biofuels, for aviation and road transport, is their chemical similarity to petroleum refined products, which allows them to be “dropped in” to existing infrastructure.

Improved Efficiency

Energy efficiency in the transportation sector takes several forms. The first is improved efficiency of conventional vehicles, aircraft, and ships through lighter materials, more efficient motors, and other design changes. These efficiency improvements can take advantage of existing infrastructure (e.g., roads, fueling stations, and ports). Indeed, most reductions that have taken place in the sector to date have relied upon these sorts of efficiencies. Electrification (including fuel cell vehicles) improves vehicle efficiency in a different way. Because electric motors are more efficient than internal-combustion engines, less overall energy is required for the same VMT.

Emissions also could be reduced through system-wide efficiency gains. Autonomous vehicles (AVs), for instance, could potentially allow higher throughput, faster speeds, fewer start-stops, and reduced congestion, dramatically reducing fuel consumption. Legal and policy frameworks to support and direct AV development are being discussed but are still in early stages.

Other Decarbonization Opportunities

Many other strategies could help reduce the sector’s emissions. Passenger vehicle VMT could be reduced through a number of methods. These include increased sharing of electric vehicles including AVs, land use planning that encourages compact development, and congestion pricing, which encourages car-pooling and mode switching (to walking, biking or mass transit). New, efficient modes of transport such as high-speed rail, and new technologies like magnetic levitation (e.g., Hyperloop One), could offer faster ground transportation of goods and people, potentially using non-emitting sources of electricity. Using alternative refrigerants for cooling applications, as encouraged by the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, also could virtually eliminate HFC emissions.

References

Rhodium Group, Final US Emissions Numbers for 2017. https://rhg.com/research/final-us-emissions-numbers-for-2017/

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, (BLS), Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2017, https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes530000.htm

U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics(BTS), Freight Facts & Figures 2017 – Chapter 5: Economic Characteristics of the Freight Transportation Industry, https://www.bts.gov/bts-publications/freight-facts-and-figures/freight-facts-figures-2017-chapter-5-economic

U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Alternative Aviation Fuels: Overview of Challenges, Opportunities, and   Next Steps, https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2017/03/f34/alternative_aviation_fuels_report.pdf

U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2018 Annual Energy Outlook with Projections to 2050, https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), DRAFT Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks 1990 – 2016, https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2018-01/documents/2018_complete_report.pdf

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2017, Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks: 1990–2015, https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/inventory-us-greenhouse-gas-emissions-and-sinks-1990-2015

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2018, Light-Duty Automotive Technology, Carbon Dioxide Emissions, and Fuel Economy Trends: 1975 through 2017, https://nepis.epa.gov/Exe/ZyPDF.cgi?Dockey=P100TGDW.pdf

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Mid-Term Evaluation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards for Model Year 2022-2025 Light-Duty Vehicles, https://www.epa.gov/regulations-emissions-vehicles-and-engines/midterm-evaluation-light-duty-vehicle-greenhouse-gas

U.S. Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), Highway Statistics 2016 Table 4.2.1 “Public Road Mileage and VMT, 1920 – 2016, https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/statistics/2016/

The post Decarbonizing U.S. Transportation appeared first on Center for Climate and Energy Solutions.

This is one in a series of briefs prepared as part of C2ES’s Climate Innovation 2050 initiative, which brings together leading companies to examine potential pathways toward substantially decarbonizing the U.S. economy. Other briefs focus on Agriculture & Forestry, Buildings, Manufacturing, Oil & Gas, and Transportation. (Note: Full citations to supporting materials can be found in the pdf version of this brief.)

This brief provides an overview of emissions trends and projections, and of decarbonization challenges and opportunities, in the U.S. power sector. Key points include:

• The power sector plays a pivotal role in any scenario for substantially decarbonizing the U.S. economy by mid-century. The sector must substantially reduce its emissions even as demand for power rises as other sectors switch from fossil fuels to electricity to reduce their own carbon emissions.
• With rising generation from natural gas, wind, and solar, the power sector has been decarbonizing at an average rate of 3 percent a year since 2008. Under a business-as-usual scenario, power generation is projected to rise 24 percent by 2050; greenhouse gas emissions will continue declining in the near term but are projected to return almost to today’s levels by 2030 and remain level through 2050.
• Decarbonizing the power sector requires a multi-faceted approach that could include: continued substitution of no- or lower-emission power sources; continued improvements in end-use efficiency; improved grid flexibility and storage; and the use of carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) on remaining fossil fuel-based generation.

Overview

The U.S. power sector converts primary energy into electricity that is used throughout the economy. In 2016, the five largest sources for electricity generation were natural gas (34 percent), coal (30 percent), nuclear (20 percent), hydro (7 percent), and wind (6 percent).

The vast majority of electricity is generated at large, central sites and transported to end users via the network of transmission and distribution lines known as the electricity grid. In some cases, such as most renewable primary energy sources (e.g., hydro, geothermal, wind), generating stations are placed at the site of the resource and cannot be relocated. Natural gas, coal, and nuclear generating stations are often sited in remote areas with fuel supply networks like river or rail.

Some electricity generation is decentralized (distributed)—that is, it is co-located with its end use. Large electricity users, like industrial facilities, hospitals and universities, sometimes generate their own electricity using natural gas, biomass, or other fuels. In the last few years, solar has become an important energy source for distributed electricity generation as well.

Generally speaking, electricity cannot be stored, so it must be generated to meet real-time demand. As a consequence, electricity flows freely through the nation’s transmission and distribution grid in response to end-use demand. To make sure there is always enough electricity supply to meet demand, a central operator or balancing authority coordinates electricity generation and distribution.

Historically, system operation required only that the output of large central power plants be ramped up or down to respond to levels of demand. This has been changing in recent years with the increased use of energy sources like wind and solar that cannot predictably ramp up or down. The growing use of distributed energy owned by end users, not power companies, is another recent trend that is adding complexity to electricity system operation.

Emissions trends and projections

Carbon dioxide (CO₂), which is emitted when fossil fuels are combusted to generate electricity, accounts for more than 98 percent of the sector’s greenhouse gas emissions. Other emissions include nitrous oxide (N₂O), which is emitted by certain types of coal-fired power plants, and sulfur hexafluoride (SF₆), which is used in electricity transmission and distribution systems.

Emissions from electricity generation rose steadily from 1990 to 2000 as total sector output grew, relying primarily on coal and nuclear. The increased use of natural gas starting in 2000 allowed total sector output to grow while emissions remained essentially flat. Despite rising economic activity since 2008, energy efficiency has held total electricity consumption steady while the increasing substitution of natural gas and renewables for coal has reduced emissions. The sector’s greenhouse gas emissions fell 20.5 percent from 2005 to 2015. In carbon intensity terms (tons emitted per unit of electricity), the sector has been decarbonizing at an average rate of 3 percent a year since 2008. The trend toward decarbonization has been somewhat moderated, however, by the early retirement of nuclear plants, which are being replaced by natural gas generation.

Looking ahead to 2050, electricity use is expected to grow steadily as the economy expands and as some new electricity-using technologies, like electric vehicles, become more common. Greenhouse gas emissions, in contrast, are projected to continue declining in the 2020s, then rise to approximately the same levels as today by 2030 and remain relatively flat through 2050. The 2018 edition of the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA’s) Annual Energy Outlook (AEO) projects in its reference case that total generation will grow 31.6 percent by 2050 because of economic growth. Most of the increased generation in the reference case will come from natural gas, which rises to 35 percent of total electricity generation, and from renewables, which grow to 31 percent of generation. Most of the growth in renewables comes from new wind and solar capacity; hydro, geothermal, and other renewables sources are expected to remain relatively flat. Coal accounts for 22 percent of total generation in 2050, only a small decline in absolute terms.

Decarbonization challenges and opportunities

The substantial decarbonization of the U.S. economy likely entails greater demand for electricity than projected in the EIA’s reference case and, at the same time, very substantial reductions in the power sector’s emissions. It is widely held that it is easier to decarbonize the power sector than other sectors as it has fewer point sources and a variety of non-emitting substitutes are available and relatively cost-competitive. Decarbonizing the power sector will likely entail a combination of: continued improvements in end-use efficiency; continued substitution of no- or lower-emission power sources; improved grid flexibility and storage; and the use of carbon capture on remaining fossil fuel-based generation.

Improved End-Use Efficiency

Efficiency opportunities are widespread across the economy, ranging from newer lighting and appliance technologies to improved building envelopes to reduce space conditioning energy needs. (See further discussion of efficiency opportunities and challenges in companion backgrounders on buildings, industry and transportation.) Even land-use policies, like promoting tree planting and cool roofs to reduce urban heat islands, can help reduce electricity demand. The extent to which efficiency opportunities are realized—and the extent to which other sectors electrify—will strongly influence electricity demand in a decarbonized economy.

Fuel Switching

Substitution of non-fossil energy sources for fossil fuels is one key to decarbonizing electricity. Of the available non-fossil sources, conventional nuclear and hydro are the most mature, in terms of technology development. As hydroelectricity can only be generated in specific locations (and essentially all suitable sites in the United States have been developed), its potential for expansion is limited. While economic pressures are forcing the early retirement of some existing nuclear plants, advanced designs now under development could allow greater nuclear generation in the future. In both nuclear and hydro, technology research is currently focused on smaller-scale applications with potential safety, cost, and environmental benefits over conventional, larger technologies.

As noted, wind and solar are projected to grow substantially in business-as-usual projections. While some estimates see nearly unlimited potential for these sources in the United States, significantly broader deployment faces key hurdles. First, the biggest wind and solar resources are not universally spread, but rather exist in isolated pockets in the Midwest (for wind) and Southwest (for solar), requiring significant expansion of the electricity grid to move power to areas of high demand. Solar rooftop PV can be deployed almost anywhere because of its small size, but its production efficiency (“capacity factor”) can be quite low in some regions, especially during winter months. A second major hurdle facing the current generation of wind and solar technologies is the intermittency of these resources. Because a grid operator cannot direct the wind to blow or the sun to shine (these resources are not “dispatchable”), and electricity must be generated in real time to meet demand, other resources will be needed. Advanced wind and solar technologies currently under development could also greatly increase their respective potential.

Improved Grid Storage

Greater reliance on more distributed and more variable low-carbon power sources would be facilitated by a larger, more flexible power grid with enhanced storage capacity. Recent and emerging technological advances in smart grid applications will need to be fully deployed to maintain reliable operation of the grid as more intermittent energy sources are developed.

Some energy is now stored through pumped hydroelectric storage—during times of supply excess electricity is used to pump water uphill to reservoirs where it can be released later to run electricity generating turbines. But since such opportunities are location-specific, other options will be needed to match wind and solar deployment. Wider deployment of batteries, flywheels, and other systems could help manage daily fluctuations in energy supply. But other technological advances may be needed to overcome seasonal intermittency—the fact that, for example, solar resources are low for half the year in northern regions. Future technological advances could address seasonal intermittency by using surplus electricity to generate hydrogen, liquid fuels, or other energy carriers that could be used generate electricity in off seasons or as fossil fuel substitutes in other sectors (e.g., zero-carbon transportation fuels). Another potential solution to intermittency is to use connected devices (intelligent efficiency) to make electricity demand more flexible. As energy end uses such as transportation and buildings are electrified and connected to smart networks, the potential for this supply-demand matching grows.

Carbon Capture

Given the assumption rapid growth in electricity demand is needed for economy-wide deep decarbonization, simply replacing existing fossil fuel sources with non-emitting energy sources for electricity generation will not be sufficient. There must be a growth in electricity supply, which likely means using some existing power plants and associated transmission infrastructure. Most U.S. decarbonization scenarios anticipate the deployment of CCUS technologies to capture the CO₂ released after combustion of fossil fuel and keep it from being emitted into the atmosphere. After the CO₂ is captured, it can be used in an industrial process, which either displaces the use of other fossil-derived CO₂ or sequesters it, for example in a plastic. Captured CO₂ can also be stored underground. CCUS can be incorporated into the original design of a facility, as is being done in a few demonstration projects worldwide, or existing fossil fuel-fired power plants can be retrofitted, as was recently completed on the Petra Nova coal-fired power plant in Texas.

References

U.S. Energy Information Administration, Monthly Energy Review, June 2018, https://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/.

U.S. Energy Information Administration, Annual Energy Outlook 2018 with Projections to 2050, https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/AEO2018.pdf.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks 1990 – 2015, https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2017-02/documents/2017_complete_report.pdf.

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