• Energy Research
• 11. Sustainability close
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• Energy Procedia close

The European Geosciences Union (EGU) brings together geoscientists from all over the world covering all disciplines of the Earth, planetary and space sciences. This geoscientific interdisciplinarity is needed to tackle the challenges of the future. One major challenge for humankind is to provide adequate and reliable supplies of affordable energy and other resources in efficient and environmentally sustainable ways. This Energy Procedia issue provides an overview of the contributions of the Division on Energy, Resources & the Environment (ERE) at the EGU General Assembly 2017.

AbstractThe CO2-neutral self-supply of heat and electric energy is an important objective for new and existing buildings in the future [1,2]. Therefor the energy autonomous house (EAH) as a new concept for single-family buildings in central Europe is presented. It represents a further development of the solar and efficiency house concepts based on full self-sufficiency in thermal (partly provided by a fireplace) and electrical energy (100%). Two occupied houses have been built in Germany and they are under an extensive scientific monitoring with real user behavior since 2014. This contribution is focused on thermal energy balances and the differences due to different user behavior and the influence of weather conditions. The evaluated solar fraction was fsol, th ≥ 71.4% and fsol, el ≥ 91.8% for both houses in 2014. So far the 100% autonomy in electricity could not be reached due to the unusual low irradiation in Jan. and Dec. 2014 (-24% / -37% compared to long term values). Nevertheless the planned low electricity consumption of ∼ 2000 kWh/year could nearly be achieved, whereby a self-consumption rate of electric energy gains of ≥ 31.8% were assumed. Further findings of 1 ½ years of monitoring of the two EAH are presented within the paper.

Abstract A fundamental challenge of the German energy transition is the energy supply of industrial and chemical parks based on renewable energy. Presently, the energy demand of a chemical park with one third electricity and two thirds heat as a rough estimate is commonly supplied by a heat-controlled fossil fired combined heat and power (CHP) plant. If applicable, the surplus electricity generated by such plants is sold and fed into the grid. Since the reliable energy supply of all users and facilities is priority, energy storage can be incorporated, if fluctuating renewable energy sources shall be used. This paper presents energy supply concepts without adjustments to the industrial park infrastructure or the processes themselves and proposes utilization of high temperature thermal energy storage (TES) technologies such as molten-salt, as well as power-to-heat (PtH) technology in the central CHP supply infrastructure. The objective of this study is to identify the major possibilities for integrating TES in a future energy supply system for an industrial park in Germany. It shall be shown how the flexibility of an utility supplier can be increased, so that further revenue can be generated from participating in the energy market. For this task different concepts will be proposed and applicable TES technologies will be identified. The benefits for the utility supplier and how carbon dioxide reduction and integration of renewable energies can be achieved will be highlighted. Finally, an overview of concepts with additional TES and PtH components for the energy supply of industrial or chemical parks in Germany is presented qualitatively. This overview includes the following criteria: flexibility, carbon dioxide reduction and the increased use of CHP. Overall a better understanding of potential flexibility measures for the utility supply infrastructure in the chemical industry is generated.

Abstract To improve food security a conceptual integration beyond the scope of production in the agricultural sector due to examination of critical supply chain system compartments and levels of services (“integrated food production and supply systems”) is proposed. For creating systematic results, a platform integrating various perspectives of experts has been established following the principle of triple helix stakeholdership (business practice, public management/policy and also science). During a series of workshops, the main actors, success factors, challenges and communication strategies have been identified for shaping sustainable food supply chains under use of systems thinking and the application of Participatory Systems mapping (PSM). In this line, the paper presents how “system maps” based on the method of PSM are used to gain insights into sustainable logistics services facilitating sustainable consumption patterns, enabling participatory considerations and the productive exchange of knowledge.

Abstract As a representation of smart and green city development, bike-sharing system is one of the hottest topic in the fields of transportation, public health, urban planning, and so on. With the development of Mobility as a Service (MaaS), emerging technologies such as mobile data mining give some new solutions for optimizing bike-sharing system and predicting the emission reduction. Here, we propose a bike-sharing layout optimization and emission reduction potential analysis structure under the concept of MaaS. A human travel mode detection method and a geometry-based probability model are proposed to support the particle swarm optimization process. We implement a comparison study to analyze the computational efficiency. Taking Setagaya ward, Tokyo as the study case with about 3 million GPS trajectories, the result shows that with the increase of station number from 30 to 90, the adoption of bike-sharing system can reduce about 3.1-3.8 thousand tonnes of CO2 emission.

Abstract Meeting the heat demand of all customers attached, is the main objective for the operation of district heating (DH) systems combined with combined heat and power (CHP) plants. On the other hand, the economic ratification for the operation of CHP plants strongly depends on highly volatile electricity prices on the market. This trend will be reinforced in future, due to the additional integration and exploitation of renewable energies. Within this techno-economic field of most different operational objectives, DH systems and CHP plants must find a way for a cost-covering and efficient operation in future. Against this background, time shifts in producing and allocating heat supplied in parallel with electricity, are most attractive for DH system and CHP plant operators. Thus, margins on the electricity market could be maximized. On the other hand, heat amounts produced in parallel should be decoupled from the production of electricity as efficient as possible. Thus, thermal energy storages enter the limelight of interest for DH system operators. However, aspects concerning most different mechanisms for energetic and exergetic losses have to be considered for an optimized operation of these systems. Within this paper, the energetic and exergetic performance of sensible thermal storages will be examined. Underlying loss mechanisms of typical urban thermal storages are described qualitatively and quantified energetically and exergetically. For this purpose, existing models from literature are combined with practically relevant operational parameters for simulations.

Abstract UN-Habitat stated in 2012 that “investment in renewable energies could generate more employment and income for urban households [1]” and for UN-Habitat renewable energies are a central element of the environmental sustainability of urban areas [2]. Renewable energy technologies are seen by the UN as instruments to support the urban transformation process [1]. However, renewable energy technologies such as direct-drive wind turbines based on permanent magnets need non-renewable resources such as rare earth minerals [3-5]. We therefore analyse rare earth production in Australia, Malaysia (Mount Weld), USA (Mountain Pass), and China (Bayan Obo). The Mount Weld process chain takes place in three countries (Australia, Malaysia, China). The Mountain Pass process takes place in the USA and China. All Bayan Obo processes take place in China. In our social life cycle assessment (sLCA), we use the five major social impact categories (labour rights & decent work, health & safety, human rights, governance, community & infrastructure) [6, 7] suggested by UNEP/SETAC [8] and assign to them 21 social indicators of the 2012 Social Hotspots Database [6] to cover every social theme in our sLCA. Using the sLCA model, we estimate the social footprint function for every production step of the three rare earth production chains. Based on the presented social footprint functions, the total social footprint of the three rare earth production sites is estimated for the year 2015 based on the development of the Human Development Index (HDI). For the Mountain Pass process, our analysis reveals very low social risks for the process parts taking place in the United States and significantly higher social risks in China. The Australian processes of Mount Weld cause also a very small social footprint, whereas the processes in Malaysia and China cause a significantly higher social footprint. The Bayan Obo processes have a considerably higher social footprint than the other two process chains.

AbstractMany countries in the world investigate the role of concentrated solar power for the future electricity generation. The technology bears many advantages in comparison with other renewable energy sources, as it can be combined with thermal energy storage and can thus be used to supply peak electricity and provide a higher flexibility and dispatchability. Availableconcepts differ in terms of energy yield, degree of dispatchability and levelized cost of electricity generation. Moreover, the possible contribution of CSP plants to grid security remains often unclear.For the example of South Africa, a booming economy with ambitiousclimate protection targets, we demonstrate the applicability of aninnovative method to analyse the future role of concentrated solar power with and without storage. Based on a calculation of energy yield and energy provision characteristics and a probabilistic reliability method we show that storage capacity substantially affects firm capacity. Results show that depending on the additional CSP capacity and storage configuration which is added to the energy system, capacity credits range from 22% to 34% for systems without storage, 47% to 69% for CSP plants with limited storage and 84% to 93% for configurations with an extended storage configuration.Using an integrated energy system optimization model, we identify that CSP with appropriate storage size is a suitable option to cost efficiently mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. In an ambitious GHG mitigation scenario for South Africa, CSP would be one of the most important mitigation measures, providing about one quarter of the total electricity in future. The results also show that it is crucial to consider the share of renewable firm capacity through the future procurement of CSP capacity with appropriate storage size in future energy planning.