Climate Ambition Research Articles

Reinforcing the Paris Agreement: Ambitious scenarios for the decarbonisation of the Central Asian and Caspian region

For its abundant fossil resources, the Central Asia and Caspian region plays a strategic role in the energy security of major markets, such as Europe and China. However, this dependence on export, added to a firm reliance on fossil fuels for internal consumption, represents a significant challenge for the decarbonisation of the region.In this paper, we perform an energy scenario analysis of four countries in the region (Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan), aiming to investigate how ambitious their regional decarbonisation targets for 2050 are in view of the Paris Agreement. We also develop a net-zero emission pathway to reinforce the regional climate ambition in the long term. As a novelty in the literature, the scenario analysis is co-designed with regional stakeholders through an engagement process that we have carried out from December 2020 to May 2021.The analysis is performed with the TIMES-CAC energy system model. Results show that current regional energy policies are insufficient for achieving ambitious climate targets in the long term (2050 and beyond). The lack of a long-term strategy to decrease the dependence on export increases the influence of importing countries’ energy policies. Even in a decarbonised scenario, the role of China remains significant, while the dependence on the European Union decreases. To limit the pressure from other countries in the energy transition, the region should start implementing a rigorous energy planning process today to fill the “ambition gap” and achieve carbon neutrality in a 40-year horizon.

After COP27: Whither climate leadership?

After COP27: Whither climate leadership? The twenty-seventh Conference of the Parties (COP27) – tasked, like every annual UNFCCC conference, to accelerate climate ambition and action – duly laboured under the current global crises. What and where next? 2022 has been a year of multi-dimensional crises as the Russian invasion of Ukraine fostered an energy crisis, deepened the food crisis and, intensified the water crisis and the ‘post-Covid' debt crisis. COP27 certainly felt the impact of these crises. Expectations of the conference were low. Indeed there was understandable worry from the environmental community that the oil and gas sector, heavily represented at Sharm El-Sheikh, would turn the climate conference into a ‘world gas trade fair' (pushing gas as the solution to the energy crisis). The dilemmas posed, for the developed countries, between short-term energy security and longer-term climate action and, for the developing countries, between development and climate action were not addressed head-on.

How to Boost Countries’ Climate Ambitions: Turning Gains from Emissions Trading into Gains for Climate

How to Boost Countries’ Climate Ambitions: Turning Gains from Emissions Trading into Gains for Climate

Circular economy strategies as enablers for solar PV adoption in organizational market segments

While the uptake of solar energy has been a success in recent years, PV panels will cause an increasing waste problem in the coming decades. At the same time, it is important to further stimulate investments in solar energy solutions to reach climate ambitions and the Sustainable Development Goals. In this paper, we investigate when circular economy strategies and business models can enable solar energy investments while mitigating its waste problem. We use focus group data from Flanders (Belgium) to address the demand side of different market segments outside the dominant residential market of homeowners. These markets have in common that they are governed or mediated by organizations and contain business-to-business and business-to-government features. Our results show that organizational solar PV investments are mainly driven by lower energy costs, independence, and secured access to energy, and that the uptake of circular solar solutions mainly depends on a viable business case. In most cases, a lack of market development and organizational boundary conditions limit the enabling potential of circular solar options. Given the current energy crisis and challenges stemming from the electrification of mobility, we recommend policy makers to invest in regulatory frameworks that support the implementation of innovative data technologies that enable both improved circularity outcomes and lower operational expenditures.

Integrated assessment of agricultural practices on large scale losses of ammonia, greenhouse gases, nutrients and heavy metals to air and water.

To gain insight in the environmental impacts of crop, soil and nutrient management, an integrated model framework INITIATOR was developed predicting: (i) emissions of ammonia (NH3) and greenhouse gases (GHG) from agriculture, including animal husbandry and crop production and (ii) accumulation, leaching and runoff of carbon, nutrients (nitrogen, N, phosphorus, P, and base cations) and metals in or from soils to groundwater and surface water in the Netherlands. Key processes in soil are included by linear or non-linear process formulations to maintain transparency and to enable data availability for spatially explicit application from field up to national level. Calculated national trends in nutrient losses over 2000-2020 compared well with independent estimates and showed a reduction in N and P input of 26 to 33 %, whereas the surplus declined by 33 % for N and 86 % for P due to increased crop yields and reduced inputs. This was accompanied by a reduction of 30-35 % in atmospheric emissions of ammonia and nitrous oxide as well a decline in N and P runoff of 35 and 10 %, respectively, whereas the emission of methane increased with 4 %. Model results compared well with (i) large scale observations of ammonia concentrations in air and nitrate concentrations in upper groundwater and ditch water, (ii) with nitrous oxide emissions and phosphorus adsorption in experiments at field scale and (iii) with metal adsorption in large scale soil datasets. Various mitigation measures were evaluated in view of policy ambitions for climate, soil and environmental quality for 2030, i.e. a reduction of 50 % for NH3, 11-17 % for GHG, 20 % for N runoff and 40 % for P runoff and an ambition of 50 % GHG emission reduction for 2050. The measures focused on a combination of animal feeding, low emission housing and application technologies, improved crop, soil and nutrient management, all being applied with an effectiveness of 100 % and 50 %, respectively. In addition, we evaluated impacts of 50 % livestock reduction, and combination scenarios of measures and livestock reduction. Full implementation of all measures can reduce NH3 emission, N leaching and N runoff by approximately 40-50 % and GHG emissions by approximately 30 %, but there is less potential to reduce P runoff, being <10 %. The combination of a more likely 50 % implementation/effectiveness of measures with 25 % livestock reduction leads to a comparable reduction. Required reductions from Dutch agriculture seem not possible with improved management only, but also requires livestock reduction, especially when the NH3 ambitions at the short term (2030) and the climate ambitions for the long term (2050) should be attained.

Due Diligence – The Lay of the Land From an Ocean-Climate Perspective

Within the universe of what is commonly referred to as systemic climate change litigation,1 national courts are typically asked to determine whether the State has met its duty of care toward its citizens as it pertains to the negative impacts of climate change. Significant negative impacts from climate change are frequently driven by ocean-related changes such as sea level rise, ocean warming and the ocean’s role as an integral part of the climate system. Even so, the focus in systemic climate litigation is on climate law rather than ocean-related legal arguments. National courts, when faced with systemic climate litigation, tend to make duty of care determinations based on the State’s conduct through the lens of due diligence. Due diligence is also the lens through which States’ obligations within both the international climate change regime and the law of the sea regime, which governs the ocean, are interpreted. The objective of this paper is therefore to explore how due diligence is articulated within each of these two international legal regimes. Section I provides a contextual overview of the importance of due diligence within national systemic climate change litigation. In Section II, the strengths and weaknesses of both legal regimes are compared through the lens of due diligence in order establish the potential applicability of inclusion of law of the sea regime in national climate litigation to drive increased climate ambition. Section III concludes with a brief look towards the future.

Investigating the impact of multi-dimensional urbanization and FDI on carbon emissions in the belt and road initiative region: Direct and spillover effects

The climate ambition led by the net zero goal has prompted growing concern among international organizations about the carbon emissions effects of urbanization and foreign direct investment (FDI) in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) region. Due to the limited data experiments, the direction and externalities of the impact of urbanization and FDI on carbon emissions in the BRI region remain largely unclear, and accounting for urbanization is also isolated. To address this knowledge gap, this study quantified the direct and spillover effects of multi-dimensional urbanization and FDI on carbon emissions using multiple remote sensing data from 2000 to 2018. The study explored the spatial distribution, evolutionary trends, bivariate evolutionary relationships, and influence mechanisms of carbon emissions with multi-dimensional urbanization and FDI by combining temporal trend (Slope), bivariate spatial autocorrelation, spatial Durbin model (SDM), and other methods. The results indicate that from 2000 to 2018, the total BRI carbon emissions added 253 million tons at an average annual growth rate of 3.68%; since 2013, the average annual growth rate has dropped sharply to 1.34%. East and South Asian countries (especially China and India) posted the highest increase in carbon emissions and had faster growth rates in multi-dimensional urbanization and FDI. Only some European countries, such as France and Germany, achieved overall carbon reduction. The results highlight the adaptability of the “Environmental Kuznets Curve” hypothesis. The “Low-Low” was the main cluster type of the evolutionary trends of carbon emissions associated with each variable. Multi-dimensional urbanization and FDI directly contributed to local carbon emissions, but the effects have gradually weakened over time (except for land urbanization). After controlling for the direct effects, we found a widespread consistently enhanced positive effects of population urbanization and land urbanization on carbon emissions in adjacent areas (especially after the BRI implementation), while FDI reduced the direct impact and strengthened the gain effect on carbon reduction in adjacent regions. Our findings confirm the importance of integrating policies to reduce emissions in population, economy, land, and foreign investment and provide strong evidence for joint governance of carbon emissions among BRI countries.

U.S. - INDIA Relations: Current Scenario

Both their respective home attempts to achieve their respective domestic climate targets and the remotivated global efforts to boost climate ambition were shared by India and the United States. Both parties reiterated their promise to the crucial role of multilateral cooperation in addressing these global macroeconomic challenges as they discussed the current challenges to the global macroeconomic outlook in the context of the conflict in Ukraine, such as rising commodity and energy prices as well as supply constraints. They both reaffirmed their commitment to stepping up their efforts to put the G20 Common Framework for Debt Treatment into effect in a realistic, timely, organised, and coordinated way.

Thoughts on Teaching Reform of Resources Majors in Colleges and Universities under the Background of Carbon Peak and Carbon Neutralization—Taking Mineral Resources Exploration Course as an Example

On 22 September 2020, General Secretary Xi made a solemn commitment to the international community at the general debate of the seventy-fifth session of the United Nations General Assembly to achieve carbon peak and carbon neutrality, and he announced specific goals at the Climate Ambition Summit. China is striving to achieve carbon peak by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060. At the same time, during the Fifth Plenary Session of the Nineteenth Central Committee of the CPC and the Central Economic Work Conference, specific arrangements for related goals have been made. During these two sessions in 2021, carbon peak and carbon neutralization were also mentioned in the government work report for the first time, which became the “hot words” discussed by the delegates and one of the key subjects of the 14th Five-Year Plan. Against the current backdrop of “double carbon”, reforms must urgently be made in the education and teaching of the resource major in colleges and universities to achieve the goal of carbon neutralization with high quality, promote discipline construction, and explore and implement the development model of “new engineering”. With regard to the resource exploration industry, mining, dressing and smelting will produce a large amount of carbon dioxide, solid waste and tailings, which can be neutralized by injecting solid waste or tailings reservoirs through green mine construction and carbon capture. On the one hand, the comprehensive utilization efficiency of mines can be improved in this way. On the other hand, a large amount of carbon can be stored underground, which is an important method of achieving the goal of carbon neutrality. In this study, we took the core course “Mineral Resources Exploration” from the resource exploration major as an example to think about and study the ways the education and teaching of resource majors could be reformed, such as exploration engineering under the guidance of the carbon neutrality target, which has certain guiding significance regarding the improvement of the training quality of resource major students.

Transformational climate action at the city scale: comparative South–North perspectives

Conceptually grounded, integrated, city-scale and comparative studies remain rare and are based mostly on meta-reviews of the literature or broad surveys. Conversely, debates about the limitations of incremental or transitional change and exhortations towards more ambitious processes of system or transformative changes are rarely grounded in adequate empirical analysis. Accordingly, this paper examines city-scale plans and actions in order to throw light on these issues in a carefully contextualised Global South–North comparison between Cape Town, South Africa, and Greater Manchester, UK. Cape Town has a considerable pedigree of citywide climate policy and action but achieving cross-departmental integration remains a key challenge, along with operationalisation and monitoring. Greater Manchester has abundant climate ambitions to become a leading European green city, but recent innovative policy processes revealed a lack of capacity and in-house expertise. The comparative analysis therefore focuses on capacity constraints hampering fulfilment of progressive city aspirations that engage with global agendas, and on how they use innovative planning and implementation processes and different forms of knowledge to address integrative or cross-cutting issues, as well as on their relative success to date in doing so in the face of different extents of inequality and power asymmetry. <em><strong>Policy relevance</strong></em> A comparative analysis of city-wide climate policy initiatives provides four insights that are highly relevant for policymakers. First, the political–institutional context in which local climate policy is designed invariably shapes the policy process, making it imperative to consider redesigning the ‘multilevel governance’ structures between the local governments that ‘hold the problem’ of climate change with the tools required to address the root causes. Second, policymakers need to grapple with and negotiate across the conflicting rationalities held by different professionals and stakeholders to bring together and integrate different types of knowledge into a comprehensive perspective. Third, local governments must find ways to address the underlying challenge of institutional inertia to embrace more ambitious, transformative policy agendas, moving away from incrementalist approaches. Finally, local governments should integrate debates on socio-spatial fairness and justice with climate policy, recognising the interdependencies between these agendas.

Citizen policy entrepreneurship in UK local government climate emergency declarations

AbstractPolicy entrepreneurship theory seeks to explain how actors, institutions, actions and interactions influence policy makers and policy outcomes; however, the role of citizens in this process remains largely unarticulated. Adopting a conception of policy entrepreneurship as a (distributed) pattern of agency rather than the actions of an individual, we analyse the development of local government climate emergency declarations (CEDs) (many of which visibly involved citizen advocacy). This analysis expands on the role of citizens in policy change and provides evidence of how citizen entrepreneurs interact collaboratively with more traditional forms of policy elites, in this case local elected representatives. Since 2018 hundreds of local governments in the United Kingdom (UK) have issued CEDs in a surge of expressions of local climate ambition. Whilst CEDs have attracted attention from scholars, the underlying dynamics and politics which drove the adoption of these policies, including the role played by citizens, remain unexplored in the literature. Interviews with councillors, council officers, and citizens reveal that citizens carry out a range of activities related to policy entrepreneurship, including problem framing, identifying solutions, networking and building coalitions, and seeking attention and opportunities. We find that they carry out these activities collectively with other citizens and collaboratively with elected representatives; whilst precise coalition‐internal dynamics vary, citizens frequently exploit opportunities to demonstrate the strength and breadth of public support for their cause.

(Re)framing Responsibility? Assessing the Division of Burdens Under the EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism

As part of its highly anticipated Fit for 55 Package, in July 2021 the European Commission introduced a proposed regulation establishing a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM). The CBAM places a price on carbon embedded in imports from certain energy-intensive sectors, and is intended to combat the risk of carbon leakage arising from the gap between EU climate ambitions and those of trading partners. In the words of Commission President von der Leyen, &lsquo;carbon must have its price &ndash; because nature cannot pay the price anymore&rsquo;. This raises the question, however, of who should pay it instead. From the EU&rsquo;s perspective, the proposed CBAM reflects the EU&rsquo;s &lsquo;responsibility to continue playing a leading role in global climate action&rsquo; through reducing its global GHG footprint in line with the Paris Agreement. However, several newly industrialised countries have attacked the proposal as discriminatory and contrary to the principles of equity and common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (CBDRRC). Against this backdrop, this article assesses how the EU&rsquo;s framing of responsibility fits within the applicable public international law framework. First the article examines how the EU&rsquo;s faming of &lsquo;responsibility&rsquo; fits within the law of state jurisdiction, which conditions regulators&rsquo; competence to place burdens on actors beyond their territory. It then turns to the division of responsibilities under the UN climate agreements, with a particular focus on opportunities for incorporating a more equitable differentiation of burdens in line with CBDRRC. Such differentiation would only be feasible for regulators if it could pass the obstacles posed by the law of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Unpacking the challenges and opportunities, it is argued that these hurdles need not be insurmountable, though much would depend on the willingness of both the EU and the WTO dispute settlement body to accommodate competing trade and environmental interests.

The path to 1.5 °C requires ratcheting of climate pledges.

Increasing climate ambition through 2030 will be crucial to limiting global peak temperature changes this century. Countries need to ratchet their 2030 pledges made in Glasgow to reduce temperature overshoot and consequently reduce the risks of irreversible and adverse consequences to natural and human systems.

Regional uptake of direct reduction iron production using hydrogen under climate policy

The need to reduce CO2 emissions to zero by 2050 has meant an increasing focus on high emitting industrial sectors such as steel. However, significant uncertainties remain as to the rate of technology diffusion across steel production pathways in different regions, and how this might impact on climate ambition. Informed by empirical analysis of historical transitions, this paper presents modelling on the regional deployment of Direction Reduction Iron using hydrogen (DRI-H2). We find that DRI-H2 can play a leading role in the decarbonisation of the sector, leading to near-zero emissions by 2070. Regional spillovers from early to late adopting regions can speed up the rate of deployment of DRI-H2, leading to lower cumulative emissions and system costs. Without such effects, cumulative emissions are 13% higher than if spillovers are assumed and approximately 15% and 20% higher in China and India respectively. Given the estimates of DRI-H2 cost-effectiveness relative to other primary production technologies, we also find that costs increase in the absence of regional spillovers. However, other factors can also have impacts on deployment, emission reductions, and costs, including the composition of the early adopter group, material efficiency improvements and scrap recycling rates. For the sector to achieve decarbonisation, key regions will need to continue to invest in low carbon steel projects, recognising their broader global benefit, and look to develop and strengthen policy coordination on technologies such as DRI-H2.

The interplay among COVID-19 economic recovery, behavioural changes, and the European Green Deal: An energy-economic modelling perspective

In the EU, COVID-19 and associated policy responses led to economy-wide disruptions and shifts in services demand, with considerable energy-system implications. The European Commission's response paved the way towards enhancing climate ambition through the European Green Deal. Understanding the interactions among environmental, social, and economic dimensions in climate action post-COVID thus emerged as a key challenge. This study disaggregates the implications of climate ambition, speed of economic recovery from COVID-19, and behavioural changes due to pandemic-related measures and/or environmental concerns for EU transition dynamics, over the next decade. It soft-links two large-scale energy-economy models, EU-TIMES and NEMESIS, to shed light on opportunities and challenges related to delivering on the EU's 2030 climate targets. Results indicate that half the effort required to reach the updated 55% emissions reduction target should come from electricity decarbonisation, followed by transport. Alongside a post-COVID return to normal, the European Green Deal may lead to increased carbon prices and fossil-fuel rebounds, but these risks may be mitigated by certain behavioural changes, gains from which in transport energy use would outweigh associated consumption increases in the residential sector. Finally, the EU recovery mechanism could deliver about half the required investments needed to deliver on the 2030 ambition.

An integrated evaluation on China's provincial carbon peak and carbon neutrality

As the climate is warming up and climate disasters occur more frequently, China's carbon peak and carbon neutrality targets are gaining attention, with provinces starting to set carbon peak targets and constantly exploring low carbon economic development opportunities. However, the existing evaluation index system mainly focuses on low carbon cities and green cities, and there is no evaluation index system for carbon peak and carbon neutrality. This study adopts a combination of theoretical and empirical research and draws on domestic and international research results to construct the first index system for evaluating China's provincial carbon peak and carbon neutrality. The evaluation index system includes 18 indicators from three dimensions: climate ambition, low carbon status, and emissions trends. Using this index system, we calculated the carbon peak and carbon neutrality indices of 30 Chinese provinces. Further, the 30 provinces were classified into six categories, and corresponding policy recommendations for achieving the “Dual carbon” targets were put forward. The evaluation index system constructed in this paper can provide a reference for future carbon peak and carbon neutrality assessments. By disclosing the integrated index of each province, we hope to effectively curb the increasing local carbon emissions; avert inaction in areas with good natural endowments; and motivate the advancement of the latter, to boost the implementation of the “Dual carbon” targets coherently for the whole country.

A three-point turn for climate ambition in transport

The 26th Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC (COP26) in Glasgow showed a number of new climate initiatives in the transport sector. In the run-up to COP26, a large number of countries made net-zero pledges, promising to reduce emissions to zero. However, a recent analysis of climate pledges by GIZ shows that key states continue to fall short in their mid-term transport sector goals. Though more countries have set sector targets, large emitters such as China, the US and India have yet to follow suit. 2022 is a crucial year for countries around the world to ramp up their climate ambition in transport.

Scaling up climate ambition post-2030: a long-term GHG mitigation analysis for Thailand

ABSTRACT Thailand’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) aims to reduce 20 to 25% of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions with respect to the projected reference level of NDC in 2030, respectively, in its unconditional and conditional scenarios. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) states that limiting global temperature rise to 1.5°C would require net zero carbon dioxide emissions globally by around 2050. Thailand’s current energy system is highly fossil fuel dependent and requires enormous transformations to achieve more stringent GHG emission reduction targets beyond its NDC. This paper seeks to estimate the level and the intensities of Thailand’s energy system and their economy-wide effects post-2030 under the business as usual and 16 GHG emission reduction scenarios ranging from 30 to 100% by 2050. A computable general equilibrium analysis using the AIM/Hub model is employed to estimate the macroeconomic impacts of meeting the unconditional and conditional emission reductions of Thailand’s NDC in 2030 along with varying GHG emission reductions in 2050. Results show that renewables – constituting solar, wind, biomass and hydro and carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies account for more than 95% in the power generation mix by 2050, if 100% GHG emission reduction from the 2010 level is to be achieved. Electricity generation based on biomass both with and without CCS will occupy a major share in the investments by 2050 in all the conditional and unconditional NDC scenarios. A rapid increase in carbon sequestration occurs from 2040 onwards through the deployment of CCS and bioenergy with CCS (BECCS) technologies in all the conditional and unconditional NDC scenarios. Carbon prices lie in the range of 3.4–266.2 US$/tCO2eq during 2025–2050 to achieve 100% GHG emission reductions in 2050. Imposition of early stringent mitigation target lowers the carbon prices in the conditional scenarios towards 2050 when compared to the unconditional scenarios. The rapid uptake of CCS, energy efficiency improvements and electrification of the end-use technologies are identified to be the key measures to transform the energy system of Thailand. Key policy insights By 2050, the Thai economy would face a higher fall in both the GDP and household consumption in the unconditional scenarios than those in the conditional scenarios at all levels of GHG emission reduction. Results indicate that early mitigation efforts can be less costly than the delayed ones in the long-term. The cumulative investment needed to achieve decarbonization in Thailand is estimated to exceed 355 billion US$2005 over the period 2010–2050 in the 100% GHG reduction scenarios. The transmission and distribution investments in the power sector need to increase by 30–35% to attain 100% GHG emission reductions during 2010–2050. The trade deficit improves by up to 23–29% in the various GHG mitigation scenarios in 2050.

Are the EU climate ambitions reflected on member-state level for greenhouse gas reductions and renewable energy consumption shares?

The aim of this paper is to review the objectives to mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and to increase the renewable energy share (RES) in gross final energy consumption from the European Commission (EC) and the related member state contributions to reflect their consistency. Therefore, a base year correction is applied and the impact of every country is derived with the help of a weighting process. As a result, the Effort Sharing Regulation (ESR) of 2018 results in a negative target gap of −11%, while the proposal from 2021 can either decrease the GHG deviation to −5% or fulfill the objective. Though some countries have consistent targets, the annual GHG reduction rate of the EU has to be tripled up to −3% per year until 2030. The required objective for RES is achievable but the growth rate has to be increased to 2% to fulfill the announced ambitions by 2030. Finally, if the most ambitious option in the proposed directive is chosen, only eight member states have consistent efforts aligned with the Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) target.

Reductions in greenhouse gas emissions through innovative co-production of bio-oil in combined heat and power plants

Integrating fast pyrolysis into existing biomass-based combined heat and power (CHP) plants offers an innovative opportunity for plant operators to acquire an additional heat sink and produce a renewable transport fuels feedstock. This technology is particularly interesting in Sweden, where biobased heat and power constitute an important part of the energy system. It is important to establish the GHG emissions reduction of the production, through e.g. substitution effects in the transport sector, to ensure coherence with climate ambitions. In this study, the GHG emission avoidance methodology in the newly introduced EU Innovation Fund (IF) was adapted to determine whether integrating bio-oil production into an existing wood-fuelled CHP plant through fast pyrolysis would lead to a significant reduction in GHG emissions compared to the status quo. The results showed a reduction in GHG emissions of up to 0.24 MtCO2-eq per year, due mainly to the replacement of fossil fuels in the transport sector. A potential production volume in existing Swedish CHP plants was estimated to be 6.8–8.1 Mt of bio-oil annually, leading to a GHG emission avoidance of 8.6–10.3 MtCO2-eq/y, requiring a wood fuel input of 181–185 PJ/y. Sensitivity analysis indicated a significant potential for the reduction using input parameters for heating, electricity and hydrogen production whether pre-defined in the IF methodology or determined from case-specific conditions. However, the detailed results indicate that case-specific conditions should be used to reflect the fact that different European countries are at different stages in the transition to a fossil-free energy system. In conclusion, according to IF-based calculations, commercialisation of combined heat, power and bio-oil technology could lead to significant GHG emission avoidance across multiple sectors.