Squaring the energy circle: will we be able to satisfy our energy needs? Mario Giampietro ICREA Research Professor, ICTA - Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Presentation at the Post-Growth 2018 Conference, 18-19 September 2018, European Parliament, Brussels
.
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement No. 689669.
CONTENT OF THE PRESENTATION 1. What went wrong with the Energiewende? 2. What if “batteries are not included” in the EU energy package? 3. Biofuels: “If they do not have bread, let them eat cake” 4. The circular bioeconomy and the elephant in the room 5. “Socially constructed ignorance”: The economics of technological promises is an implausible, irresponsible and, above all, ungovernable narrative!
1. What went wrong with the Energiewende?
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-germany-emissions/
f cs o es i m ono romis c e lp he #1 t ologica n tech https://www.politico.eu/article/report-german-parties-agree-to-drop-2020-climate-goal/
Intermittent 200
Peaker
Extra supply
“Surprise� supply Baseloader 400
200
Baseload supply
100
100 100 100 100
100
The metaphor of the water distribution grid
Comparing different sources of electricity Power capacity
Utilization factor
Hours of production
Electricity produced
Percentage of electricity used by grid
GWh MW
Baseloaders
1 MW
0.80
7,000 h/year
7 GWh
100%
7/1
Peakers
1 MW
0.34
3,000 h/year
3 GWh
100%
3/1
Intermittents* 1 MW
0.10 0.30
900 h/year 2,600 h/year
0.9 GWh 2.6 GWh
It20-30% depends* ?
0.2/1 ? 0.8/1
* May be produced when not needed, or not be produced when needed!
• Why should an increase in power capacity of intermittents be good news? • Why should a lower production cost of 1 kWh with intermittents be attractive for users seeking “supply security” (24/7/365)? • Without an effective system of storage intermittents not necessarily reduce costs and solve problems . . .
The need for ‘taming’ intermittent sources . . .
Requirement and supply
Intermittents
Peakers
Time scale
2. What if batteries are not included in the EU energy package? Functional elements of a modern electric grid cannot be powered by unreliable sources (intermittent). To tame the intermittency, we need storage!
+ f cs o es i m ono romis c e lp he #2 t ologica n tech
+
Checking the scale of operations
Tokyo at 25 GW of electricity consumption would require for just one day under typhoon
600 GWh
600 GWh/400 MWh It would be 1,500 times short of buffer capacity . . .
Vaclav Smil By 2021 the largest announced storage system (more than 18,000 Li-ion batteries) will be in Long Beach for Southern California Edison: it will be capable of running at 100 MW for 4 hours
400 MWh
24,000 GWh?
2 million cars
165 GWh
In EU we have about 290 million cars 105 GWh
?! 20 GWh
Source: Bloomberg New Energy Finance, Avicenne https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-04/tesla-flips-the-switch-on-the-gigafactory
The world's largest battery storage substations . . .
Southern California Edison (SCE)
20 MW peak/80 MWh storage (it can buffer 20 MW for 4 hours)
3. Biofuels: “if they do not have bread, let them eat cake�
f cs o es i m ono romis c e lp he #3 t ologica n tech
Marie Antoinette
nutrients
nutrients
W/m2 nutrients W/m2 nutrients W/m2
W/m2
% W/m 0 1 < 2
s a Useful Energy FUNDw n o i t W/m2
d l nutrients r o w f o W/m2
o p
a l pu
n a b r u
W/m2
nutrients
nutrients
W/m2
nutrients
nutrients
W/m2
n o i t a l u p o p
leakage
CITIES W/m2
n a b
ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES Useful Energy FLOW (fossil energy)
FARMS
d l r o w f o
is
nutrients
% 0 5 FARMS
W/m2
leakage
r u
W/m2 nutrients
W/m2 FARMS
leakage
Power density in end-uses
Power density in supply
after Vaclav Smil 2015 Power Density (data from Fig. 7.5)
4. The circular bioeconomy and the elephant in the room
of s c i om mises n o c l pro he e #4 t ologica n tech
Q5
harvested biomass
Q4 Q3 Q2
SUN
Expected relations over the components of terrestrial ecosystems respecting ecological regulation
Q1
human control
Detritus Q6
Low External Input Agriculture
Biomass production based on circular flows of nutrients
niches
populations
harvested harvestedbiomass biomass
Q5 Q4 Q3
Eliminating ecological regulation in biomass production
Q2
SUN Q1
Detritus Q6 fertilizers fertilizers humancontrol control human
High External Input Agriculture
pollution pollution
Biomass production based on linear flows of nutrients
Post-industrial economies based on linear flows
Pre-industrial economies based on circular flows
5. “Socially constructed ignorance” the economics of technological promises is a narrative that is implausible, irresponsible and above all ungovernable “To make sense of the complexity of the world so that they can act, individuals and institutions need to develop simplified, self-consistent versions of that world. The process of doing so means that much of what is known about the world needs to be excluded from those versions, and in particular that knowledge which is in tension or outright contradiction with those versions must be expunged. […] But how do we deal with […] dysfunctional cases of uncomfortable knowledge […]?”
S. Rayner
The ‘ancien régime’ syndrome “a state of affairs in which the ruling elite becomes unable to cope with stressors and adopts instead a strategy of denial, refusing to process either internal or external signals, including those of danger” After Funtowicz and Ravetz, 1994 (i) Citizens want to preserve their fabulously high standards of living; (ii) Governments want to preserve their majority at the next elections; (iii) Banks and powerful industrial complexes want to preserve their control on the economy; (iv) Scientists providing inputs to the sustainability discussion want to preserve their position and research funds.
This project has received funding from the European Unionâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement No. 689669.
Thank you for your attention!
http://magic-nexus.eu
#MAGIC_NEXUS @MAGIC_NEXUS
https://www.facebook.com/MagicNexusEu/
The present work reflects only the author's view and the Funding Agency can not be held responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains.