Renewable electricity in Turkey: Life cycle environmental impacts

Abstract

This paper applies a life cycle approach to evaluate for the first time the environmental impacts of renewable electricity in Turkey. There are 305 power plants utilising hydro, wind and geothermal resources, all of which are considered in the study. The results indicate that the impacts from large reservoir hydropower are lower than for the small reservoir (by 45%–72%) and run-of-river hydropower (by 74%–84%). The exceptions are the global warming potential (GWP) and summer smog which are two times and 45% higher for large than small reservoir, respectively. Onshore wind is the worst option overall, with nine out of 11 impacts higher than for hydropower and geothermal. However, its GWP is 9 times and 11% lower than for geothermal and large reservoir, respectively. Acidification from geothermal is 281 times higher than for wind power. Geothermal is the best option for six impacts. Large reservoir has the lowest depletion of elements and fossil resources as well as acidification. Small reservoir and run-of-river plants are the best and geothermal the worst options for the GWP. The majority of the annual impacts from the renewable electricity mix are from hydropower with the exception of acidification which is largely from geothermal electricity.