Sep 10, 2021 03:07 AM
https://grist.org/energy/for-a-livable-f...he-ground/
EXCERPTS: To achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement, countries will likely need to set hard limits on the extraction of fossil fuels in addition to supporting the deployment of clean energy. That’s one of the key takeaways of a new study published in the journal Nature on Wednesday by energy and climate modelers from University College London.
The researchers set out to estimate how much of the world’s fossil fuel reserves must remain in the ground in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial temperatures — the target named in the Paris Agreement that would prevent the most catastrophic impacts of climate change. They found that in order to have a 50 percent chance of achieving this target, 58 percent of known oil reserves, 59 percent of natural gas reserves, and 89 percent of coal reserves cannot be extracted. This means that global oil and gas production must decline 3 percent on average every year until 2050.
[...] Damon Matthews, a climate scientist at Concordia University stressed that this was a significant assumption that ignores questions about sustainability. The model relies heavily on a form of negative emissions that involves burning plants for energy and capturing their emissions, also known as bioenergy with carbon capture. “Many of the things that might limit the viability of that as a mitigation technology are not necessarily included in the model, including competition with food, competition with ecosystems, the need to meet biodiversity goals, issues with land rights with respect to indigenous land titles,” Matthews told Grist. If the authors took the possibility of a major scale-up of bioenergy with carbon capture out of the equation, their estimates for fossil fuel reserves that must be left in the ground would increase.
[...] the results are based on an idealized world free of politics. In the real world, for example, Canada is subsidizing oil production, which is expected to increase 20 percent by 2040. The industry is a key source of jobs and revenue for local economies there. The authors acknowledged during the press conference that their model cannot take policy into account. “If the government insists on supporting the oil sands industry, what our modeling results show is that from a techno-economic point of view, and from a climate point of view, that doesn’t make sense,” Dan Welsby, the lead author of the study told reporters.
The world is nowhere on track to achieve the production cuts consistent with this analysis. Pye said that investors need to recognize that further investment in fossil fuel extraction is not only not compatible with the Paris Agreement, but will also become increasingly risky as countries become more serious about climate change and enact policies that reduce demand. He also pointed to the need for more international cooperation to manage the decline of fossil fuels, including support for nations whose economies are heavily reliant on the industry.
There are indications that the “keep it in the ground” movement has begun seeping out of the realm of activists and into policy. Thirteen cities and sub-national governments have signed a new fossil fuel nonproliferation treaty that supports the phase-out of fossil fuels... (MORE - details)
EXCERPTS: To achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement, countries will likely need to set hard limits on the extraction of fossil fuels in addition to supporting the deployment of clean energy. That’s one of the key takeaways of a new study published in the journal Nature on Wednesday by energy and climate modelers from University College London.
The researchers set out to estimate how much of the world’s fossil fuel reserves must remain in the ground in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial temperatures — the target named in the Paris Agreement that would prevent the most catastrophic impacts of climate change. They found that in order to have a 50 percent chance of achieving this target, 58 percent of known oil reserves, 59 percent of natural gas reserves, and 89 percent of coal reserves cannot be extracted. This means that global oil and gas production must decline 3 percent on average every year until 2050.
[...] Damon Matthews, a climate scientist at Concordia University stressed that this was a significant assumption that ignores questions about sustainability. The model relies heavily on a form of negative emissions that involves burning plants for energy and capturing their emissions, also known as bioenergy with carbon capture. “Many of the things that might limit the viability of that as a mitigation technology are not necessarily included in the model, including competition with food, competition with ecosystems, the need to meet biodiversity goals, issues with land rights with respect to indigenous land titles,” Matthews told Grist. If the authors took the possibility of a major scale-up of bioenergy with carbon capture out of the equation, their estimates for fossil fuel reserves that must be left in the ground would increase.
[...] the results are based on an idealized world free of politics. In the real world, for example, Canada is subsidizing oil production, which is expected to increase 20 percent by 2040. The industry is a key source of jobs and revenue for local economies there. The authors acknowledged during the press conference that their model cannot take policy into account. “If the government insists on supporting the oil sands industry, what our modeling results show is that from a techno-economic point of view, and from a climate point of view, that doesn’t make sense,” Dan Welsby, the lead author of the study told reporters.
The world is nowhere on track to achieve the production cuts consistent with this analysis. Pye said that investors need to recognize that further investment in fossil fuel extraction is not only not compatible with the Paris Agreement, but will also become increasingly risky as countries become more serious about climate change and enact policies that reduce demand. He also pointed to the need for more international cooperation to manage the decline of fossil fuels, including support for nations whose economies are heavily reliant on the industry.
There are indications that the “keep it in the ground” movement has begun seeping out of the realm of activists and into policy. Thirteen cities and sub-national governments have signed a new fossil fuel nonproliferation treaty that supports the phase-out of fossil fuels... (MORE - details)
