Use Of Low-carbon Technologies Research Articles

Natural resources extraction and global COP26 target: An overview of USA economy

The most pressing problem facing the globe in these modern times is that of the environment, which is being harmed by carbon emissions. When economic expansion is taking place at a breakneck pace, maintaining environmental protection is widely regarded as a formidable obstacle for the economies of the globe. The environmental problems that are a direct result of carbon emissions have garnered a lot of attention recently, and it is essential to make use of renewable energy technology in order to address these issues. The extent to which a countries natural resource reserves are important for economic and environmental performance as well as the magnitude of its effect have been widely contested. The current research took into account the reliance on natural resources as a crucial aspect in meeting the spike in environmental concerns in the United States. Using the data for USA from 1984 to 2021, this study empirically analyses the nexus between TNRENT and CO2E. The findings indicate that REC, and TI are all capable of reducing carbon emissions. However, TNRENT and GDP are responsible for rising CO2E in USA. Therefore, in order to support sustainable economic development, the United States ought to enhance their research and use of low-carbon technologies. Based on the findings, it appears that the United States of America has to prioritize environmental protection on par with economic expansion and ensure that the expansion comes after the former.

Might future electricity generation suffice to meet the global demand?

Electricity supply is one of the critical issues in the energy field. Due to the high shares of greenhouse gases emissions, the electricity sector is experiencing a transition towards a progressively wider use of low-carbon technologies. At the same time, electrification of end-use sectors is identified as one of the most suitable mitigation strategies, although requiring larger electricity production. This paper relates the historical development trends for installed capacity of electricity production technologies to the theory of the S-curves, building a method to depict plausible developments in the electricity sector. Projections are performed considering the existence of an upper limit for industrial capacity development, and according to a path envisaging a revolutionary, an evolutionary and a maturity phase for technologies showing considerable growth trends. Oppositely, stagnation is taken into account for those not showing any remarkable progress. The computed curves are used to perform forecasts about electricity generation potentials until 2050, showing how the projected growth trend of electricity generation technologies would result in a production sufficient to meet the expected global demand, even excluding the contribution of fossil fuels in some cases. In perspective, the presented method can be applied to retrieve maximum capacity constraints for energy system models.

ENERGY TRANSITIONS IN NIGERIA: THE ROLE OF POLICIES FOR THE ADOPTION OF LOW-CARBON TECHNOLOGIES AND SYSTEM INTEGRATION

This study underscores the role of Policies for adopting low-carbon technologies and system integration in Nigerias energy transition. Although the nation has abundant energy resources, a sizeable section of its people lacks access to power, creating severe problems with energy accessibility. To address this problem, the government has implemented several programmes and plans. However, the high initial costs of low-carbon technology, particularly in rural regions, have hampered their development. The study emphasises the importance of a user-centred approach, contextualisation of technology, consideration of social norms, and the role of intermediaries in facilitating the adoption and use of low-carbon technologies. It also highlights how policy interventions can either accelerate or delay the adoption of low-carbon technologies. The study recommends that policymakers and technology developers adopt a holistic approach by considering various issues in policy formulation concerning the transition to low-carbon technologies. KEYWORDS: Energy Transitions, Low-Carbon Technologies, System Integration, Policies, Plans, and Nigeria

Energy Transition Manifesto: A Contribution towards the Discourse on the Specifics Amid Energy Crisis

The article seeks to describe a more realistic approach to the transition to a carbon-neutral energy model in the current period of economic and geopolitical turbulence, with the high volatility of energy prices, and the disruption of geopolitical and logistic ties, and puts forward a set of fundamental principles for the energy transition. The hypothesis tested is that the development of low-carbon energy is based on the structural-technological diversification of production methods and rationalization of energy consumption through expanded electrification and application of energy demand-side management programs. The analysis of the main approaches to the energy transition across the world shows that many countries now prioritize renewable energy sources, even though, despite their obvious environmental benefits, they are less reliable due to their intermittent nature. The proposed principles of the energy transition draw from a more flexible, compromise approach that implies an optimal balance of mutually reinforcing centralized and distributed technologies of energy generation and their characteristics. The key provisions of the manifesto were verified by means of theoretical generalization and graphical interpretation of data from a number of analytical reports of international energy agencies and the results of an expert opinion survey. The survey was conducted among leading Russian experts from energy companies, who had relevant experience of developing innovation projects in this sphere, and university researchers. Most of them subscribe to the view that, despite the economic downturn, it would be unfeasible to curtail energy transition programs at this point, and even more so, it is important to continue local modernization projects. The results of the study could have a practical application when planning structural, organizational, and market transformations aimed at achieving the objectives of energy transition amid growing uncertainty, including the expansion of the structure of generating capacities in regional energy systems and the active use of low-carbon technologies in the energy sector and related industries.

Styles of decarbonization

ABSTRACT What characterizes the relations amongst actors engaged in decarbonization? I posit that no single characteristic can satisfactorily explain the heterogeneous politics of reducing emissions and propose the concept of styles as the patterned ways in which actors relate to each other to decarbonize. Based on qualitative fieldwork, I compare two projects for a national policy mandating the use of low-carbon technologies – India’s Smart Cities Mission – and find variation in their styles. In Rajkot, local state, business, and policy elites with a variety of interests converged to impose decarbonization on a site used by herders as pasture. In Davanagere, local industry, workers, state bureaucrats, and experts independently bargained over a plan that accommodated livelihoods in a puffed rice manufacturing district. I theorize styles as a systematic heuristic to capture variation in the politics of reducing emissions and identify surprising coalitions for decarbonization.

CO2 Emissions and The Transport Sector in Malaysia

Transport is an essential infrastructure for development. With its high share of gross domestic product (GDP), it makes a significant contribution to total CO2 emissions in Malaysia. It is therefore important to pay greater attention to reducing CO2 emissions and sustainable development in this sector. Therefore, this study aims at estimating the relationship between transport CO2 emissions and its key drivers using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) technique. The time period covered by the study extends from 1978 to 2018. It further investigates the response of CO2 emissions to shocks in the value of other variables by employing the generalized impulse response approach. The results suggest that urbanization is the major contributor to the increase in CO2 emissions followed by the carbon intensity of energy in the long-run. Carbon intensity of energy, GDP per transport worker and urbanization contribute significantly to increases in transport CO2 emissions in the short- and long-run. Testing the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis recommends that Malaysia continue to be on track to reach the highest level of income and welfare to give pay more attention to the environment. Therefore, the country maintains its CO2 emissions level in the future because of economic development. Therefore, these findings show that energy and environmental policymakers need to pay more attention to improving energy efficiency and the use of low-carbon technologies and electrification in the transport sector and the use of high-quality public transport, particularly in urban areas, for sustainable urban development.

ТРЕНДЫ РОССИЙСКОГО ЭНЕРГЕТИЧЕСКОГО СЕКТОРА В КОНТЕКСТЕ ЭНЕРГОПЕРЕХОДА 4.0

The paper presents the transition of the world economy to the vector of decarbonization in order to achieve sustainability, which is a certain challenge for countries, exporting hydrocarbons, including Russia, is chosen as a key area of analysis. Demand for energy in the world is constantly growing and it is important to satisfy it in the context of the energy transition. The article considers the development directions of the Russian energy sector in the context of ongoing transformations in the world economic system. It also notes the priority for the Russian economy of expanding technological opportunities for the use of low-carbon technologies and the development of promising areas of cooperation with partner countries in that field. A conclusion is drawn that the achievement of the goals of sustainable development of the Russian economy is possible due to the environmental factor and requires the adoption of strategic decisions in the energy sector of the country

Investigating the Implications of the London Heathrow Airport Expansion for the Landside Freight Industry

The air cargo industry is hugely important to national economies, trade, and development. Thus far, there has been limited research on the landside freight industry. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to extend the understanding of how alterations in the air cargo industry impact on its landside freight counterpart. It also seeks to explore the potential opportunities and challenges this presents, as well as the measures that can be taken to mitigate unsustainable development for the landside freight industry. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect the views of key stakeholders, freight industry experts, and other professionals. Our findings show that, if the airport expansion went ahead, the opportunities would generally outweigh the challenges. Increased freight activities and other positive spinoffs would result in the long-term. Increased freight activities and employment were the prime positive implications. Conversely, increased delays due to congestion was the main negative implication. Measures suggested to mitigate the adverse effects of the London Heathrow Airport (LHR) expansion entailed strengthening of consolidation centre efforts, freight collaboration, intelligent booking systems, use of low-carbon technologies, smart scheduling for revising the timetabling of deliveries, and greater use of rail transport for air cargo. The research highlights novel insights regarding existing freight-related issues from industry and academic experts, and further thoughts in relation to increased cargo activities stemming from the LHR expansion.

Augmenting the distillate water flux of sweeping gas membrane distillation using turbulators: A numerical investigation

The enhancement of distillate water obtained from sweeping gas membrane distillation (SGMD) is rarely discussed in published works compared with other membrane distillation (MD) configurations, although it has the lowest thermal losses and does not need vacuum sealing. The present study aims at augmenting the distillate flux of SGMD modules by adding wires (turbulators) that work as turbulence promoters in the sweeping gas channel. A mathematical model was developed to simulate the transport processes of the distillate flux, considering the basic conservation equations for a hydrophobic polytetrafluoroethylene membrane layer, and the feed and air channels. Deviations of less than 10% were reported using experimental data of a pilot-scale module. The results showed that applying turbulators can reduce the vapor concentration polarization at the membrane–gas interface, leading to a considerable enhancement in the distillate flux. The effect of turbulators arranged in inline and staggered schemes with different diameters and membrane–turbulator gaps was numerically investigated. At feed temperatures of 60 °C and 40 °C, the SGMD module using turbulators produced distillate flux of 13.85 kg h−1 m−2 and 4.97 kg h−1 m−2, providing 34.3% and 39% increases over the cases without turbulators, respectively. This increases the potential use of low-carbon technologies to heat the SGMD feed.

МЕТОДИЧЕСКИЕ ОСНОВЫ ЭФФЕКТИВНОГО ФУНКЦИОНИРОВАНИЯ ИНСТИТУТА НИЗКОУГЛЕРОДНОЙ СЕРТИФИКАЦИИ ЗАСТРОЙЩИКОВ

The adverse effects of the construction from the perspective of reducing greenhouse gas emissions are becoming increasingly important in terms of sustainable development and the growth of construction output. Construction actors involved in the process of creating buildings are responsible for the deterioration of the environmental situation. Flexible tools to motivate construction participants to actively and purposefully decarbonize construction and maintain the production and use of low-carbon technologies should be established. Multilevel institutional tools for regulating extended responsibility of construction participants through organizational and economic incentives for low-carbon design and construction and optimization of building design solutions are presented in the article. Recommendations are also provided to improve the environmental safety of construction, including the establishment of the of low-carbon certification institute for developers, based on a cost estimate of the carbon impact of buildings used in the development of compensatory and incentive measures. The proposed methodological aspects of rational low-carbon design and construction of buildings with minimal carbon footprint will allow to formulate the basic principles of functioning of the low-carbon certification institute of builders as a tool to improve their bid competitiveness.

Деякі проблемні питання в ядерній енергетичній галузі України

Institute for Safety Problems of Nuclear Power Plants (NPP) of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine at a meeting of the National Commission for Radiation Protection of Ukraine on June 1, 2020. It is described the crisis in the nuclear industry due to approval of the new energy balance for 2020 by the Ministry of Energy and Environmental Protection of Ukraine. According to this balance, the volume of electricity production by NPP decreased and at the same time the share of thermal power plants and “green energy”, which produce much more expensive electricity, increased in the energy market. The situation is analyzed and recommendations are given for the implementation of measures to improve it. It is shown that the main task of the Ukrainian energy sector will be to continue the course of market relations and to abandon excessive market regulation. Market relations will lead to the fact that generating companies with cheaper energy will be able to sell it not at the cost level price, but at tariffs that have formed in the market. The price of nuclear energy will be brought up to the level of the price of energy produced by thermal power plants. Consumption costs will increase, but government generation will receive more funds, and the state will decide where to direct them: to subsidies for the population or to the development of nuclear or renewable energy. It is proposed to make the necessary changes to the legislation on “green energy”; establish a reasonable tariff for energy produced at NPPs; to introduce technical and organizational measures to ensure the operation of NPP power units in shunting modes. It is concluded that the optimal solution for the future from the standpoint of the both environmental and economic policy of Ukraine is the gradual replacement of NPP power units, which have “exhausted” project resource, with modern new ones with a higher level of safety. This will support the share of NPPs in the energy balance of Ukraine at 40−50%, as well as contribute to the fulfillment of its commitments to increase the use of low-carbon technologies in energy. As for solving energy problems of Ukraine on the basis of promising technologies — small modular reactors (SMR), this strategy does not yet have a proper feasibility study and is not confirmed by the necessary proven practice, as in the world such reactors are still being developed. Observations on the construction of the Central Spent Fuel Storage Facility (CSFSF) for long-term storage of spent fuel from the power units of Rivne, Khmelnytskyi and South-Ukraine NPPs were made. The construction of the CSFSF is under threat because already at the final stage of construction it was decided to liquidate the division of NNEGC “Energoatom”, which was engaged in the construction. Such an incomprehensible decision will not lead to anything positive, but will only delay the commissioning period of the storage facility by 1−2 years. It is shown that the construction of a New Safe Confinement (NSC) over the Shelter object of the Chornobyl NPP is just an intermediate stage in the transformation of the Shelter object into an ecologically safe system. In the near future, it is necessary to perform dismantling of building structures of the Shelter object, the term of operation of which ends in 2023. This is prompted by cases of destruction and collapse of building structures of this object, which occurred last year, and therefore this issue requires immediate solution. The critical state of nuclear science in Ukraine is reflected and it is warned that if the financial support does not change properly, in the coming years the country will be left without a unique scientific institution that conducts research on the safety of nuclear facilities, including the most dangerous in the world Shelter object. Emphasis is placed on the complete absence of a safety culture at the highest level of the country’s leadership, the lack of which is manifested in violations of national norms and international standards, the absence of some leaders in nuclear industry and dangerous enterprises, as well as the attitude of government agencies to the nuclear industry.

Hybrid PV/battery‐storage unit for residential applications

Under their ‘Gone Green’ deployment scenario, National Grid forecast that energy generated from photovoltaics (PV) in the UK is expected to rise from 2 to 15 GW over the next 20 years. This is being driven by the UK's legal obligations around installing renewable energy sources and cutting greenhouse gases, the rising cost of energy and concerns around the security of supply. Power electronic converters are a key enabling technology for PV and other low-carbon technologies (LCTs). However, the use of LCTs can result in problems for the electrical distribution network such as supply voltage distortion and over-voltages, which threaten to limit or delay their uptake. The project described here is investigating the use of GaN-based converters in a hybrid PV/battery-storage unit for residential applications. The potential for MHz operation of GaN offers smaller, lighter, more efficient, and lower cost converters compared with existing silicon-based units and their deployment could lead to an increase in the installed LCT capacity on the network.

Adoption and Use of Low-Carbon Technologies: Lessons from 100 Finnish Pilot Studies, Field Experiments and Demonstrations

Experimentation is critical for the deployment of low-carbon technologies. New solutions need to be selected and adapted to their contexts of use, and users need to learn new skills. Society as a whole needs to create new modes of production, consumption and governance. We investigated how local pilot projects, demonstrations and trials of low-carbon technologies promote learning in Finnish society, where the government has made a commitment to a culture of experimentation. We drew on a database of 100 pilot projects and experiments and 15 detailed case studies. We identified several types of learning, beyond the formal evaluation of “what works where and when”: pilot projects served to inspire, to create commitment and to develop networks. We also investigated how lessons learned are transferred to other sites and into societal knowledge. We contribute by conceptualizing different forms of learning and transfer—particularly situated and embodied forms—alongside more techno-scientific ones. While highlighting this form of learning, we also note that it is not particularly strong in acknowledging challenges faced in experimentation. We argue that there is scope for more systematic evaluation, alongside more situated forms of learning and sharing. We also pinpoint tensions between these two forms of learning that need to be addressed.

Modeling the economic dependence between town development policy and increasing energy effectiveness with neural networks. Case study: The town of Zielona Góra

Due to the changes in legal requirements, growth of energy consumption from different media and prices increase it is necessary to change the attitude of urban consumers. Achieving the objectives of energy policy in each country requires societies to consolidate the confidence that reducing the demand for energy will pay to each household. Creating a positive investment climate, promoting new models and the dissemination of good examples can also lead to economic growth through the use of low-carbon technologies. In many countries, including Poland, the high energy intensity of buildings is seen as a result of the use of low quality materials, low constructing awareness causing the low standard of residential buildings, which is the reason for forcing thermal renovations.This article presents the distribution of market potential of savings for energy efficient renovations in construction on the example of a medium-sized city of Zielona Gora (Poland), which may be representative of cities in the country and in the world. The potential was determined on the basis of technology and a year of a construction of the buildings, technologies used, kind of development and dominating kind of heat and power supply. The calculated potential was presented as the value of the investments necessary to reduce energy consumption by 1kWh/m2. Artificial neural networks, which represent a sophisticated modeling technique and are among the computational intelligence methods were used to compute a distribution of potential. The article makes use of possibilities of multi-layer artificial neural networks trained by back propagation error technique and neural networks with radial basis functions, which is a new feature in the analysis of the energy potential.

The impacts of wind technology advancement on future global energy

To avoid additional global warming and environmental damage, energy systems need to rely on the use of low carbon technologies like wind energy. However, supply uncertainties, production costs, and energy security are the main factors considered by the global economies when reshaping their energy systems. Here, we explore the potential roles of wind energy technology advancement in future global electricity generations, costs, and energy security. We use an integrated assessment model performing a series of technology advancement scenarios. The results show that double of the capital cost reduction causes 40% of generation increase and 10% of cost ​decrease on average in the long-term global wind electricity market. Today’s technology advancement could bring us the benefit of increasing electricity production in the future 40–50years, and decreasing electricity cost in the future 90–100years. The technology advancement of wind energy can help to keep global energy security and stability. An aggressive development and deployment of wind energy could in the long-term avoid 1/3 of gas and 1/28 of coal burned, and keep 1/2 biomass and 1/20 nuclear fuel saved from the global electricity system. The key is that wind resources are free and carbon-free. The results of this study are useful in broad coverage ranges from innovative technologies and systems of renewable energy to the economic industrial and domestic use of energy with no or minor impact on the environment.

Exploration of low-carbon rural tourism in zhejiang: A Case Study of Tian Mu Village, Lin an County

Along with the advancement of the construction of ecological civilization, low-carbon economy and low-carbon tourism are increasingly affecting the production and life style of human beings. Low carbon tourism is in the process of tourism development, through the use of low-carbon technologies, promote carbon absorbing mechanism and advocate low carbon tourism consumption to obtain higher tourism experience quality and greater tourism economic, social and environmental benefits of a sustainable development of tourism in new ways . Low carbon has become a recognized future development direction of the tourism industry. Closely linked to this paper, vigorously develop low carbon tourism industry requirements, to Lin an, Zhejiang Tian mu village, for example, through on-the-spot investigation, the problems existed in the village rural tourism low carbon analysis, and put forward the corresponding countermeasures, in order to rural tourism and low-carbon development in our province to find a feasible and with a demonstration of the significance of the road, and for other areas to carry out low carbon tourism experience.

The role of uncertainty in future costs of key CO2 abatement technologies: a sensitivity analysis with a global computable general equilibrium model

Deep emission cuts rely on the use of low carbon technologies like renewable energy or carbon capture and storage. There is considerable uncertainty about their future costs. We carry out a sensitivity analysis based on Gauss Quadrature for cost parameters describing these technologies in order to evaluate the effect of the uncertainty on total and marginal mitigation costs as well as composition changes in the energy system. Globally, effects in total cost often average out, but different regions are affected quite differently from the underlying uncertainty in costs for key abatement technologies. Regions can be either affected because they are well suited to deploy a technology for geophysical reasons or because of repercussions through international energy markets. The absolute impact of uncertainty on consumption increases over the time horizon and with the ambition of emission reductions. Uncertainty in abatement costs relative to expected abatement costs are however larger under a moderate ambition climate policy scenario because in this case the marginal abatement occurs in the electricity sector where the cost uncertainty is implemented. Under more ambitious climate policy in line with the two degree target, the electricity sector is always decarbonized by 2050, hence uncertainty has less effect on the electricity mix. The findings illustrate the need for regional results as global averages can hide distributional consequences on technological uncertainty.

Evaluating the effects of policy innovations: Lessons from a systematic review of policies promoting low-carbon technology

We report on an original systematic review of 165 empirical, ex post studies examining policies that promote the development and use of low-carbon technologies. Policy is defined broadly to include diverse instruments (e.g., eco-labels, voluntary agreements, emission credits, and taxes), developed, administered, and promoted by state and non-state actors (e.g., cities, states, corporations, business associations, and non-governmental organizations) that are relevant to climate change. By disaggregating policy designs, we are better able to understand the features of policies (e.g., instrument type, regulatory target, built-in flexibility) associated with effectiveness and the trade offs different features create among evaluation criteria. Our analysis, thus, sheds new light on the final and arguably most important criterion of policy innovations – the extent to which they have lasting consequences.

The Emergence of Low Carbon Energy Autonomy in Isolated Communities

This study examines the concept of switching from a centralised energy supply model towards a more autonomous model based on the use of low carbon technologies, from the viewpoint of isolated communities in the industrialised world. The study begins by establishing the importance of isolated communities within the field of energy research, and examining the concept of low carbon energy autonomy. It then analyses a number of exemplary case studies from across Europe, all of which have adopted (or are in the process of adopting) a highly autonomous energy supply model based on the use of low carbon technologies. The communities studied exhibit many of the theoretical challenges and opportunities associated with low carbon energy autonomy, including the potential for stimulating socio-economic development. They also highlight the need for a supportive and structured policy framework and more transparent routes to project funding, in order to lessen the reliance for the success of such projects upon motivated community groups. The role of academia and its relationship with industry was found to be important and the findings call for much greater transparency and knowledge sharing between key stakeholders to facilitate increased development and deployment of low carbon energy autonomy in the future.

Energy efficiency improvements in ammonia production—perspectives and uncertainties

The paper discusses the energy consumption and energy saving potential for a major energy-intensive product in the chemical industry-ammonia, based on technologies currently in use and possible process improvements. The paper consists of four parts. In the first part, mainly references to various ammonia production technologies are given. Energy consumption, emissions and saving potentials are discussed in the second part. Thereby, the situation in Europe, the US and India is highlighted and various data sources are compared. In the third part of the paper, a novel approach for modeling energy efficiency improvements is described that accounts for uncertainties and unobserved heterogeneity in the production processes. Besides new investments, revamping investments are also included in the modeling and the development of the production stock is accounted for. Finally, in the fourth part, this approach is applied to the modeling of energy efficiency improvements and CO 2 emission reductions in ammonia production. Thereby, considerable improvements in specific energy use and CO 2 emissions are found in the reference scenario, yet under the assumption of high oil and gas prices, a partial switch to coal based technologies is expected which lowers notably the CO 2 efficiency. Introduction of a CO 2 penalty under a certificate trading or other regime is on contrary found to foster energy efficiency and the use of low carbon technologies.