IEA PITCHES FOUR NEW EMISSIONS REDUCTIONS MEASURES FOR 2020

Tamar Hallerman
GHG Monitor
6/14/13

A new International Energy Agency report released this week suggests that limiting the construction and use of sub-critical coal-fired power plants, implementing energy efficiency measures, halving fugitive methane emissions from gas production and phasing out some of the world’s fossil fuel subsidies could deliver “significant” emissions reductions globally by 2020 while not harming economic growth. In a new report, “Redrawing the Energy-Climate Map,” the Paris-based IEA pitches a new short-term pathway that it says will ensure that the world, for at least the time being, can stay under the goal of limiting global temperature increases to no more than 2°C above pre-industrial levels.

IEA called on governments to swiftly enact four policy actions as soon as possible, which it said would reduce energy-related greenhouse gas emissions 8 percent below current levels. The plan, the “4-for-2°C scenario,” calls for: 

• Limiting the construction and use of the world’s “inefficient” subcritical coal-fired power plants, particularly in countries like China, India and the U.S. The move would reduce CO2 emissions by an estimated 640 Mt in 2020 and help curb local air pollution, IEA said, while growing the use of renewables and natural gas;
• Implementing energy efficiency efforts for buildings, appliances, industry and transport. IEA said that action would account for about half of the needed emissions reductions; 
• Halving fugitive methane emissions from upstream oil and gas operations; and
• Partially phasing out fossil fuel consumption subsidies, which totaled $523 billion in 2011. IEA said that effort would reduce emissions by 360 Mt in 2020 and support energy efficiency efforts.

The report acknowledges that atmospheric CO2 concentrations have recently surpassed 400 parts per million for the first time in more than three million years and that global warming has fallen to the back burner of international policy priorities. IEA said the four policies could provide a path of last-resort for easy emissions reductions through the end of the decade using existing technologies. “We identify a set of proven measures that could stop the growth in global energy-related emissions by the end of this decade at no net economic cost,” the report’s head author, IEA Chief Economist Fatih Birol, said at the report’s launch event earlier this week. “Rapid and widespread adoption could act as a bridge to further action, buying precious time while international climate negotiations continue.”

IEA: Actions Can’t Wait Beyond 2020

The report says that delaying the move to the 2°C trajectory until after 2020 would result in “substantial additional costs to the energy sector.” Taking no action would avoid $1.5 trillion in low-carbon investments before 2020, but would cost $5 trillion in additional investments thereafter to get back on track, according to the report, while increasing the risk of assets needing to be retired early, idled or retrofitted. “The question is not whether we can afford the necessary investments given the current economic climate. The fact is we simply cannot afford to delay,” IEA Executive Director Maria van der Hoeven said.

The report does not estimate much of a role for CCS in the lead up to 2020, but sees it as an insurance policy of sorts. “Carbon capture and storage can act as an asset protection strategy, reducing the risk of stranded assets and enabling more fossil fuel to be commercialized,” the report says, although it does not expect the technology to make any sort of significant dent in CO2 emissions by that time. The report said that the wide deployment of large-scale CCS “still remains distant.” “Ultimately, a huge scale-up in CCS capacity is required if it is to make a meaningful impact on global emissions,” according to the report.