Electricity costs and carbon emissions, by technology

The European Commission has issued a technical document that rounds up cost and emissions data for the principal electricity generating technologies. It’s likely to be used as a reference document in E.U. energy policy discussions, so let’s see what’s in it.

Global warming: blast from the past

It’s the summer of  ’53. Elvis makes his first recording, Watson and Crick publish the structure of DNA … and Time magazine and Popular Mechanics report the very latest research findings:  it turns out that man-made carbon dioxide emissions are causing the Earth to heat up.

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Carbon emissions from electricity generation, by country

This post lists the CO₂ emissions from electricity generation alone, rather than from total energy use, and presents the data on a country-by-country basis.

Converting from a mass of carbon to a mass of carbon dioxide

A very short post about a very small point of arithmetic.

Why a 2°C target? The impacts of global warming

Policy makers in the European Union have committed their countries to a long-term goal of limiting global temperature rise to 2°C above pre-industrial levels. Where does the 2°C figure come from? What happens if it’s exceeded?

The cost of carbon abatement

What are the cheapest ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions? How much does each carbon abatement measure cost? How does energy efficiency compare against energy generation? “Cost curve” analyses can provide some answers.

Energy economics in an era of carbon pricing

How much does low carbon electricity cost? What carbon price is needed to make it economical, and how does that price compare with the true external costs of carbon emissions?

Energy mix and carbon emissions, country by country

How does a country’s energy mix affect its CO₂ emissions? Here are the CO₂ emissions per capita and per unit GDP for the industrialised economies, compared against their energy mix. Low energy consumption works well, a low-carbon energy mix works well, the two together are a winning combination. Switzerland comes out best on emissions intensity.

Carbon emissions from electricity generation: JUST the numbers

This is a truncated summary of the previous post (about carbon emissions from electricity generation), with just the table of CO₂ emissions data and references left in it.

Carbon emissions from electricity generation: the numbers

I’ve gathered together nine life cycle analyses comparing the “cradle-to-grave” CO₂ emissions for electricity from fossil fuels, nuclear and renewables. The analyses are taken from a diverse range of industrial, academic and environmental organisations. Surprisingly, they all agree with each other. Here are the emissions numbers, side-by-side.