The amount of energy produced by coal will decrease in the future, even if the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan is not implemented, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s 2016 Annual Energy Outlook. “Coal use declines in the reference case, and even in the no-CPP case, although coal retains a larger market share it doesn’t go up,” Adam Sieminski, EIA administrator, said Tuesday, presenting the report at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
According to the report, which projects national energy data through 2040, if the Clean Power Plan is not implemented coal will account for 14 percent of the national energy mix in 2040, down from 16 percent in 2015. In the report’s reference case, which assumes Clean Power Plan implementation, coal drops to just 10 percent of the nation’s energy mix.
The Clean Power Plan requires states to develop action plans to meet federally set emissions reduction goals. The rule is currently on hold under a stay granted by the Supreme Court in February while the legal challenge to the Clean Power Plan progresses through the federal court system. If the regulation survives legal challenge, it is expected to come into effect in late 2017 or early 2018. It remains uncertain at this time if the compliance deadlines in the rule will be shifted if it is upheld. Compliance could be required as early as 2022.
The report also found that U.S. carbon emissions are expected to be lower than had been predicted in the 2015 Annual Energy Outlook throughout the outlook period. In the 2015 reference case, CO2 emissions were projected to drop slightly before 2020 and then increase to around 5,500 million metric tons. Emissions currently sit around 5,300 million metric tons. In the new report, even in the no-CPP scenario, CO2 emissions are not expected to exceed 5,500 million metric tons. In the 2016 reference case, CO2 emissions are expected to drop below 5,000 million metric tons by 2030 before increasing to just over 5,000 million metric tons around 2035.
“EIA is one of the few organizations that admits that we don’t always get it right; you can look back at the prior forecasts and see how things have changed as the markets have evolved and technology shifts,” Sieminski said.
The reason for the decrease in emissions in the no-CPP case is the decreasing cost of renewable energy generation. “The combination of the Clean Power Plan and relatively low natural gas prices result in natural gas and renewables permanently surpassing coal generation [in terms of net electricity generation] by the mid- and late-2020s, respectively,” Sieminski said, discussing the reference case with CPP implementation.
Power generation from renewable sources does increase in the no-CPP case, but not so much as to surpass coal. Natural gas, however, will outdo coal in both scenarios. In the reference case, energy production from natural gas surpasses coal in the mid-2020s, and in the no-CPP case in the late-2020s.
