• Energy Research

Technological development is key for national strategies to cope with the Paris Agreement's goals. Technology Needs Assessments (TNAs) aim to identify, prioritize, and diffuse climate change mitigation and/or adaptation technologies in developing countries. Their methodology includes a multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) framework but, although many countries already conducted a TNA, literature lacks discussions on country-specific processes for a TNA, as it usually follows a one-size-fits-all approach. This paper provides empirical evidence on the importance of country-driven processes that help shaping international programmes into country-specific needs and capabilities. It presents lessons learned from a tailored process for identification, prioritization, and selection of mitigation technologies in the scope of a TNA project for Brazil, an exceptional case of a developing country with strong capacity in integrated assessment modelling (IAM) scenarios for guiding its climate strategies. A previous IAM scenario result allowed pre-selecting technologies in six key economic sectors, while other TNAs prioritized no more than three. This allowed the elaboration of an overall ranking from the MCDA, in contrast to sectoral rankings that are mostly employed in other countries' TNAs. The overall ranking serves not only as a basis for the selection of priority technologies but also provides information on the integrated innovations framework for climate technologies in the country. Further specific findings of the tailored Brazilian TNA approach are discussed in the paper in order to call for the importance that a technology transfer project should not only be country-driven but also conducted through a country-specific process.The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11027-022-10025-6.

AbstractBioenergy could play a major role in decarbonizing energy systems in the context of the Paris Agreement. Large‐scale bioenergy deployment could be related to sustainability issues and requires major infrastructure investments. It, therefore, needs to be studied carefully. The Bioenergy and Land Optimization Spatially Explicit Model (BLOEM) presented here allows for assessing different bioenergy pathways while encompassing various dimensions that influence their optimal deployment. In this study, BLOEM was applied to the Brazilian context by coupling it with the Brazilian Land Use and Energy Systems (BLUES) model. This allowed investigating the most cost‐effective ways of attending future bioenergy supply projections and studying the role of recovered degraded pasture lands in improving land availability in a sustainable and competitive manner. The results show optimizing for limiting deforestation and minimizing logistics costs results in different outcomes. It also indicates that recovering degraded pasture lands is attractive from both logistics and climate perspectives. The systemic approach of BLOEM provides spatial results, highlighting the trade‐offs between crop allocation, land use and the logistics dynamics between production, conversion, and demand, providing valuable insights for regional and national climate policy design. This makes it a useful tool for mapping sustainable bioenergy value chain pathways.

Abstract Different long-term mitigation scenarios indicate carbon capture and storage associated with biomass (BECCS) might play a significant role in climate-change mitigation efforts, especially when it comes to long-term temperature stabilization. The ethanol fermentation process is considered as an early opportunity for BECCS deployment due to its low capture costs. Being a major ethanol producer, Brazil stands in a privileged position for the development of this technological option. However, previous scientific studies indicate several challenges for the deployment of a CO2 transportation network in the country, mostly as a result of the associated seasonality of the sugarcane industry and consequent idleness observed in the carbon transportation infrastructure. To address those issues, this study developed and applied a methodology to design an optimum carbon network considering an alternative concept: the incorporation of new CO2 emission sources aiming at guaranteeing adequate operational flows throughout the year, minimizing idleness and reducing transportation costs. Findings indicate that the incorporation of new CO2 emission sources reduces transportation costs. The inclusion of CO2 from both the cogeneration process and fossil sources results in an average levelized cost of transportation of 26 US$/tCO2 (54% lower than transportation costs in the baseline case). However, this reduction in transportation costs does not compensate for the increase in capture costs, resulting in higher levelized abatement costs for the whole system. Indeed, cases including cogeneration have reached a levelized abatement cost of approximately 125 US$/tCO2 (84% higher than in the baseline case). Nevertheless, by reducing transportation costs the strategy adopted in this study could facilitate the development of a carbon transportation network. Additionally, the integration of fossil-derived CO2 has proved beneficial to the system, allowing improvements in flow regularity and reducing idleness problems related to the seasonality of biogenic sources.

Abstract The growing importance of negative emission technologies in the energy sector for a “well-below 2 °C” world by 2100 seems to be a great opportunity for biological carbon capture and storage (BECCS) in the Brazilian sugarcane ethanol industry, given the low capture costs of the CO2 produced during the alcoholic fermentation process and the potential to store and use the CO2 for Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) in mature oil fields in the country. Notwithstanding, previous scientific studies indicated high transport infrastructure costs as a major constraint for the economic feasibility of exploiting this potential. This work developed and applied a methodology to design an optimal sugarcane ethanol BECCS CO2 network (the baseline) together with two alternative concepts: one considering an inter-modal network of road and pipeline transport and another with a multiple-hub system. The results for the system’s abatement costs, including sensitivity analyses for the best- and worst-case scenarios, ranged between 32 and 87 US$/t of CO2. The road modal choice cut-off range applies to distilleries with a CO2 annual production under 150–200 kt and further than 250–300 km from the hub. For the reference case, 70 out of the 236 distilleries opted for the road modal connection to the hub.

Abstract This study aims to identify the potential for the deployment of diesel biofuel production based on forestry residues conversion through Fischer-Tropsch synthesis in Brazil. It develops a technical and economic analysis to estimate in what extension (georeferenced analysis) and at what costs (process analysis) can this biomass-based diesel contribute to the Brazilian diesel supply, and to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Findings indicate the annual techno-economic potential of 80.3 PJ (considering the use of eucalyptus and pine residues), mostly concentrated in the South, Midwest and Southeast regions of the country. Overall, 21 production hotspots were identified, allowing the deployment of 27 facilities across the country. A clear advantage of this fuel production route is the fact that the carbon capture and storage can be intrinsic to the process, leading to negative CO2 emissions of the fuel production chain. Total mitigation potential is nearly 25 MtCO2 yearly. Furthermore, while still not cost-competitive without ambitious climate and energy policies in place, the forestry residue-based diesel can contribute to the reduction of the country's dependency on imports, resulting in positive impacts on the Brazilian trade balance.

Abstract In recent years, the decarbonisation of international shipping has become an important policy goal. While Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) are often used to explore climate mitigation strategies, they typically provide little information on international shipping, which accounts for around 0.75 GtCO2/yr. Here, we perform the first multi-IAM analysis of international shipping, drawing on the results of six global models. Results indicate the need for decreasing emissions in the next decades, with reductions up to 88% in 2050. This is primarily achieved through the deployment of low-carbon fuels. Models that represent several potential low-carbon alternatives tend to show a deeper decarbonisation of international shipping, with drop-in biofuels, renewable alcohols and green ammonia standing out as the main substitutes of conventional maritime fuels.

AbstractTo reach net-zero greenhouse gas targets, carbon dioxide removal (CDR) technologies are required to compensate for residual emissions in the hard-to-abate sectors. However, dependencies on CDR technologies involve environmental, technical and social risks, particularly related to increased land requirements for afforestation and bioenergy crops. Here, using scenarios consistent with the 1.5 °C target, we show that demand and technological interventions can substantially lower emission levels in four hard-to-abate sectors (industry, agriculture, buildings and transport) and reduce reliance on the use of bioenergy with carbon capture and storage. Specifically, demand measures and technology-oriented measures could limit peak annual bioenergy with carbon capture and storage use to 0.5–2.2 GtCO2e per year and 1.9–7.0 GtCO2e per year, respectively, compared with 10.3 GtCO2e per year in the default 1.5 °C scenario. Dietary change plays a critical role in the demand measures given its large share in residual agricultural emissions.