A life cycle perspective on the land use and ecosystem services of energy transitions

Abstract

<p>Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a cradle-to-grave method that quantifies the environmental impacts of products and processes from materials extraction to waste disposal.  While LCA is frequently applied to better understand greenhouse gas emissions, land use is much less explored.  The relationship between energy infrastructure and land use will be explored using a life cycle perspective, elucidating impacts related to an energy transition to high growth in renewable energy.  Renewable power is often correlated with higher land use than its fossil fuel counterparts, but it is increasingly recognized that more consistent, robust methods are required to confirm such results.  By developing a systematic method to estimate the life cycle land use of electricity generated from natural gas in the Barnett shale region of Texas, recent results suggest that the land use of gas-fired power can be comparable to renewable options.  Going beyond land use alone, ecosystem services provide a useful approach to characterizing impacts associated with land use. Using the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) framework, both land requirements and ecosystem services can be quantified using a life cycle perspective.  An analysis of three types of power plants in the United States portion of the Chihuahuan Desert – natural gas, solar, and wind – provides insight into the ecosystem impacts of energy transitions.  Our results suggest that wind development in the region ranks lowest in terms of both land requirements (in meters squared per Megawatt-hour (m<sup>2</sup>/MWh)) and ecosystem services value (in dollars per MWh), followed by natural gas-fired electricity then solar.  Ecosystem services costs for developments in this region are low relative to levelized costs of electricity (<5%) but are subject to relatively low values compared to other regions - results will vary with regionalized ecosystem services values and different products.  Methods and results will illuminate areas of future research for better understanding land use and ecosystem impacts of energy transitions.</p><p>References</p><p>Jordaan, S.M., Heath, G.A., Macknick, J., Bush, B.W., Mohammadi, E., Ben-Horin, D., Urrea, V. and Marceau, D., 2017. Understanding the life cycle surface land requirements of natural gas-fired electricity. Nature Energy, 2(10), p.804.</p><p>Jordaan, S. M., J. Lee., M. McClung, and M. Moran (in press). Quantifying the ecosystem services of electricity generation in the U.S. Chihuahuan Desert using a life cycle perspective.  Journal of Industrial Ecology.</p>