Energy and climate challenges for the future

1. Energy and climate challenges for the future • ICREP • Improving energy access through climate finance: picking the winners • 26 to 28 March 2013 University of Twente (Enschede)

2. This panel • Rodolfo Taccani (Italy) - Università degli Studi di Trieste · Department of Industrial and Information Engineering; Cenergy SME - Mechanical Engineering, Engineering Thermodynamics, Mechanical Design. • Nate Hagens (USA) - Vice President at the investment firms Salomon Brothers and Lehman Brothers converted to ecological economist, lead editor of The Oil Drum, on Board of Post-Carbon Institute, appeared on PBS, BBC, and NPR, and has lectured around the world. • Alexey Voinov (NL) - Faculty of Geoscience and Earth Observation, UTwente - Spatio-temporal modeling and sustainability science, systems analysis and thinking.

3. Alternative energy Peak oil (and other resources) Need more energy Increased variability: - floods- droughts- hurricanes - heat waves, etc. Need for adaptation and mitigation The Triple Whammy of Today Globally • Climate change • Peak oil • Globalization Climate change

4. The Triple Whammy of Today • Climate change • Peak oil • Globalization

5. Fact: Climate is changing and will be changing! The consequences can be dire

6. Result: no action • 2009 - Copenhagen - no results • 2010 - Emissions had risen by a record amount, despite the worst recession for 80 years. 30.6 gigatonnes come from fossil fuels (1.6 Gt more than the previous year)1 • 2011 - No new global climate agreement will be reached before 2016, and even then, it would not come into force until 20202. • 2012 - Rio+20 Non-binding declaration, committing the world’s politicians to modest goals 1 IEA report: http://www.iea.org/index_info.asp?id=1959 2 http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/may/29/carbon-emissions-nuclearpower

7. Climate Change as a ‘Convenient Truth’ • Delayed effects - no need to act immediately • Global - causes are spatially displaced from effects • Complex and uncertain - hard to communicate, easy to deny

8. Rising costs

9. EROEI • EROEI (Energy Return on Energy Invested) index. If Eout is the amount of energy produced, and Ein – the amount of energy used in production then EROEI = Eout / Ein. • “It requires about 750 kilojoules to lift 15 kg of oil 5 km out of the ground - a physical fact that will vary little when the number of digits in the worlds banks increases or shrinks”. • NEG (Net Energy Gain) = Eout - Ein

10. EROEI Hall, C.A.S.; Day, J.W., Revisiting the limits to growth after peak oil. American Scientist 2009, 97, 230-237. http://www.theoildrum.com/node/8625

11. Rapeseed in Europe

12. Systems dynamics of oil production

13. Results The alternative energy is starting to develop but it is too late. The EROEI of conventional energy falls to 1 as the reserves dwindle, making further extraction impossible.

14. Results Early investment in Alternatives, while there is still ample supply of conventional energy, allows for a smooth transition to renewable energy.

15. Resource depletion

16. Progress and technology The Ford Model T CoupletIntroduced: 1908 Cost: $850 (about $19,000 today) Horsepower: 20 Cylinders: 4 Top Speed: 45 mph Miles per gallon: 13-21 Seats: 6-7 adults Seatbelts: no Airbags: no Radio: no Air conditioning: no Windshield wipers: none Tata Motor's Nana Introduced: 2008 Cost: $2,500 today Horsepower: 30 Cylinders: 2 Top Speed: 65 mph Miles per gallon: 50-54 Seats: 4-5 adults Seatbelts: yes Airbags: no Radio: no Air conditioning: yes (on deluxe models) Windshield wipers: one

17. Progress and technology • India population - 1.1 billion • In 2005, Indian vehicles released 219 million tons of carbon dioxide • By 2035, CO2 is projected to increase to 1,467 million tons, due to the expanding middle-class and the expected rise of low-cost cars

18. Jevons paradox - aka Rebound effect • William Stanley Jevons, a British economist, while studying the coal industry in England noticed a strange phenomenon: as more efficient technology is developed, overall consumption does not decrease. "The economy of fuel is the secret of the economy of the steam-engine; it is the fountain of its power, and the adopted measure of its effects. Whatever, therefore, conduces to increase the efficiency of coal, and to diminish the cost of its use, directly tends to augment the value of the steam-engine, and to enlarge the field of its operations." C. W. Williams, The Combustion of Coal, 1841, p. 9.

19. http://www.opec.org/library/Annual%20Statistical%20Bulletin/interactive/FileZ/Main.htmhttp://www.opec.org/library/Annual%20Statistical%20Bulletin/interactive/FileZ/Main.htm Globalization

20. BP Statistical Review of World Energy 2007 Globalization

21. Globalization • Cross-border financial asset accumulation has tripled over the past decade • Global cross-border flows reached a record $6.4 trillion in 2005. IMF Global Financial Stability Report http://www.imf.org/external/Pubs/FT/GFSR/2007/01/index.htm

22. Conclusion: no more local crises - they are global

23. Conclusions • Everything is global, including crises • 6,000,000,000+ people who try to maximize their consumption • Global change requires adaptation • Adaptation requires new infrastructure and, hence, more energy • Conventional energy sources are on a decline • Alternative energy sources require new infrastructure and, hence, more energy • Do we have enough energy supply to meet the demand?