2 results
Chapter 7 - Wind Energy
-
- By Ryan Wiser, Zhenbin Yang, Maureen Hand, Olav Hohmeyer, David Infield, Peter H. Jensen, Vladimir Nikolaev, Mark O'Malley, Graham Sinden, Arthouros Zervos, Naïm Darghouth, Dennis Elliott, Garvin Heath, Ben Hoen, Hannele Holttinen, Jason Jonkman, Andrew Mills, Patrick Moriarty, Sara Pryor, Scott Schreck, Charles Smith, Christian Kjaer, Fatemeh Rahimzadeh
- Edited by Ottmar Edenhofer, Ramón Pichs-Madruga, Youba Sokona, Kristin Seyboth, Susanne Kadner, Timm Zwickel, Patrick Eickemeier, Gerrit Hansen, Steffen Schlömer, Christoph von Stechow, Patrick Matschoss
-
- Book:
- Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation
- Published online:
- 05 December 2011
- Print publication:
- 21 November 2011, pp 535-608
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
Executive Summary
Wind energy offers significant potential for near-term (2020) and long-term (2050) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions. A number of different wind energy technologies are available across a range of applications, but the primary use of wind energy of relevance to climate change mitigation is to generate electricity from larger, grid-connected wind turbines, deployed either on- or offshore. Focusing on these technologies, the wind power capacity installed by the end of 2009 was capable of meeting roughly 1.8% of worldwide electricity demand, and that contribution could grow to in excess of 20% by 2050 if ambitious efforts are made to reduce GHG emissions and to address the other impediments to increased wind energy deployment. Onshore wind energy is already being deployed at a rapid pace in many countries, and no insurmountable technical barriers exist that preclude increased levels of wind energy penetration into electricity supply systems. Moreover, though average wind speeds vary considerably by location, ample technical potential exists in most regions of the world to enable significant wind energy deployment. In some areas with good wind resources, the cost of wind energy is already competitive with current energy market prices, even without considering relative environmental impacts. Nonetheless, in most regions of the world, policy measures are still required to ensure rapid deployment. Continued advances in on- and offshore wind energy technology are expected, however, further reducing the cost of wind energy and improving wind energy's GHG emissions reduction potential.
15 - The Economics of Near-Term Reductions in Greenhouse Gases
- Edited by Irving M. Mintzer, Stockholm Environment Institute
-
- Book:
- Confronting Climate Change
- Published online:
- 06 January 2010
- Print publication:
- 11 June 1992, pp 217-236
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
Editor's Introduction
Many analysts have suggested that limiting the risks of rapid climate change by reducing the emissions of greenhouse gases will be very costly, especially in advanced industrial economies. Using simple models, such analysts argue that emissions-reducing technologies will increase the costs of production. These costs, they say, will divert investment from more productive opportunities and penalize the companies and countries that impose the most stringent environmental constraints on their domestic activities.
In this chapter, Eberhard Jochem and Olav Hohmeyer demonstrate that just the opposite is true. Economies benefit, even in the short term, from strategies that promote environmental protection through the development of new technologies. To make their point, these authors start with a difficult case: the Federal Republic of Germany, which has already achieved substantial gains in energy efficiency during the last two decades, but where opportunities for further improvement, and even greater economic benefit still exist.
Using a sophisticated macro-economic analysis, Jochem and Hohmeyer show, for the German case, that policies to improve energy efficiency and to shift the energy mix to advanced technologies and less carbon-intensive fuels will generate four important kinds of benefits for the national economy. Such policies will (1) spur overall economic growth, (2) quickly generate a large number of jobs within the country (including the sort of entrepreneurial jobs which encourage a resourceful, self-sufficient, and satisfied workforce), (3) increase exports of high technology products, and (4) reduce environmental and social costs of energy use that were previously uncounted in the market transactions for fuel. Taken together, these benefits will work to reduce the social costs paid by the society as a whole to subsidize economic development.