• Energy Research

The Swedish pulp and paper industry has gone through a strategic change in its approach to electricity production and consumption over the past decade. This paper documents this reorientation, which includes increased on-site electricity production, investments and investment plans for wind power, and new partnerships concerning investments in electricity production assets. We also assess the extent to which these changes can be attributed to key energy and climate policies. Our analysis shows that this strategic reorientation has been driven by changes in the underlying economic conditions for the pulp and paper industry, in particular increases in the price of electricity following the Swedish energy market reform in 1996, and the introduction of the EU ETS. The scheme for tradable renewable electricity certificates, on the other hand, has provided a new source of income. While these market-based signals and responses are the most dominant drivers of strategic change, cognitive changes in the pulp and paper industry have also played a role in the strategic reorientation. The cognitive changes concerning the functioning of the electricity market, i.e. the pricing of electricity and influence of the EU ETS, have been particularly important in this regard.

District heating (DH) systems may contribute to reducing the use of fossil fuels for heating purposes since they enable the use of waste heat and facilitate the use of renewable energy sources. This paper focuses on the transformation of the Swedish DH systems with regard to energy supply in 1960–2011. Swedish DH production was completely dependent on oil until the late 1970s, while today it is dominated by biomass and other renewable energy sources. The objectives of this paper are to describe and explain the fuel transition in the context of the main events that have characterized the development of the Swedish DH sector. For this purpose, we employ theories and approaches grounded in the literature on systems of innovations, especially the Multi-Level Perspective. The study shows that the transition involved a series of steps. Initiated by the oil crises in the 1970s the oil-based regime collapsed rapidly, while the growth of the biomass-based regime was a steered process governed by actors and supported only by external events. The lessons learned from the transition towards low-carbon and more sustainable DH systems in Sweden could be useful in the challenging task of steering future energy transitions in other countries and sectors.

The objective of this study was to calculate indicative ranges of production costs and assess the main sources of cost for a number of energy crops, both annual and perennial, on a regional level in Europe. The production costs were calculated in terms of the economic compensation required by the farmer in order to grow the crop, and therefore include not only the cost of cultivation, but also the costs of land and risk, which are often omitted in production cost calculations. The cost of land was calculated as the opportunity cost based on the production of cereals. Thus, higher food prices lead to higher land costs, which in turn lead to higher energy crop production costs. The analysis was performed for three cases with different assumptions concerning yields and production cost reductions resulting from scale (total cultivation area in the region), and learning effects. The calculated energy crop production costs were found to be consistently lowest for short- rotation coppice (SRC) crops and highest for annual straw crops. The production costs of SRC crops were calculated to be about 4-5 € GJ -1 under present conditions and 3-4 € GJ -1 under improved future conditions. The production costs for perennial grasses were calculated to be about 6-7 € GJ -1 and 5-6 € GJ -1 under present and improved future conditions, respectively. The production costs for annual straw crops were estimated to be 6-8 € GJ -1 under present conditions with small potential for cost reductions in the future.

Poland, as many other countries, has ambitions to increase the use of renewable energy sources. In this paper, we review the current status of bioenergy in Poland and make a critical assessment of the prospects for increasing the share of bioenergy in energy supply, including policy implications. Bioenergy use was about 4% (165PJ) of primary energy use (3900PJ) and 95% of renewable energy use (174PJ) in 2003, mainly as firewood in the domestic sector. Targets have been set to increase the contribution of renewable energy to 7.5% in 2010, in accordance with the EU accession treaty, and to 14% in 2020. Bioenergy is expected to be the main contributor to reaching those targets. From a resource perspective, the use of bioenergy could at least double in the near term if straw, forestry residues, wood-waste, energy crops, biogas, and used wood were used for energy purposes. The long-term potential, assuming short rotation forestry on potentially available agricultural land is about one-third, or 1400 PJ, of current total primary energy use. However, in the near term, Poland is lacking fundamental driving forces for increasing the use of bioenergy (e.g., for meeting demand increases, improving supply security, or further reducing sulphur or greenhouse gas emissions). There is yet no coherent policy or strategy for supporting bioenergy. Co-firing with coal in large plants is an interesting option for creating demand and facilitating the development of a market for bioenergy. The renewable electricity quota obligation is likely to promote such co-firing but promising applications of bioenergy are also found in small- and medium-scale applications for heat production. Carbon taxes and, or, other financial support schemes targeted also at the heating sector are necessary in the near term in order to reach the 7.5% target. In addition, there is a need to support the development of supply infrastructure, change certain practices in forestry, coordinate RD&D efforts, and support general capacity building. The greatest challenge for the longer term lies in reforming and restructuring the agricultural sector. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. (Less)

Replacing fossil jet fuel with biojet fuel is an important step towards reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from aviation. To this end, Sweden has adopted a GHG mandate on jet fuel, complementing those on petrol and diesel. The GHG mandate on jet fuel requires a gradual reduction in the fuel’s GHG emissions to up to 27% by 2030. This paper estimates the potential production of biojet fuel in Sweden for six integrated production pathways and analyzes what they entail with regard to net biomass input and the amount of hydrogen required for upgrading to fuel quality. Integrated production of biofuel intermediates from forestry residues and by-products at combined heat and power plants as well as at the forest industry, followed by upgrading to biojet fuel and other transportation fuels at a petroleum refinery, was assumed in all the pathways. The potential output of bio-based transportation fuels was estimated to 90 PJ/y, including 22 PJ/y of biojet fuel. The results indicate that it will be possible to meet the Swedish GHG mandate for jet fuel for 2030, although it will be difficult to simultaneously achieve the GHG mandates for road transportation fuels. This highlights the importance of pursuing complementary strategies for bio-based fuels.

This paper analyses the potential biomass Supply in the 15 EU countries (EU15), 8 new member states and 2 candidate countries (ACC10), plus Belarus and the Ukraine. The objective of this study is to make a more detailed assessment of the potential in Europe than previously undertaken. For this purpose five scenarios were designed to describe the short-, medium- and long-term potential of biomass for energy. The scenarios are based on assumptions regarding residue harvests, energy-crop yields and Surplus agricultural land. Energy-crop yields are correlated with the national wheat yields, a methodology we have not seen used in biomass assessments before. Our assessments show that under certain restrictions on land availability, the potential supply of biomass energy amounts to up to 11.7 EJy(-1) in the EU15 and 5.5 EJy(-1) in the ACC10. For comparison, the overall energy supply in the EU15 totalled 62.6 EJy(-1) in 2001. Consequently, there are no important resource limitations in meeting the biomass target, 5.6E Jy(-1) in the EU15 by 2010, which was set by the European Commission in the 1997 White paper on renewable energy sources (RES). However, given the slow implementation of the RES policy it is very unlikely that the biomass targets will be met. (C) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The target of zero emissions sets a new standard for industry and industrial policy. Industrial policy in the twenty-first century must aim to achieve zero emissions in the energy and emissions int...

Factors that affect and influence industrial symbiosis (IS) collaborations have been researched extensively in the literature, where they are mostly reported at a network level or for IS in general, and lack the individual actor’s perspective. This review article contributes to and expands knowledge of influencing factors and their effect on the individual actor. In a systematic review, guided by the PRISMA 2020 guidelines, this study reviews 53 scientific papers examining planned or existing IS networks. It examines literature from 1 January 2000 to 28 March 2022, and it identifies drivers, barriers, and enablers influencing actors to participate in IS. It explores whether and how the perception and impact of these factors differs depending on the characteristics of individual actors and their specific context. The main findings of this study reveal that an actor’s specific characteristics and the network’s context have a significant impact on decision making and how actors both perceive and are affected by factors influencing collaboration. Furthermore, an additional novel contribution to this field of research is that the study identifies three underlying and recurring considerations that actors appear to find critical, namely, perceived business opportunities/risks, regulatory and political setting, and potential inequalities in the network. The results show that an actor’s take on these critical considerations determines whether the actor is willing to engage in IS.