IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/enepol/v39y2011i5p2482-2489.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Potential for reducing global carbon emissions from electricity production--A benchmarking analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Ang, B.W.
  • Zhou, P.
  • Tay, L.P.

Abstract

We present five performance indicators for electricity generation for 129 countries using the 2005 data. These indicators, measured at the national level, are the aggregate CO2 intensity of electricity production, the efficiencies of coal, oil and gas generation and the share of electricity produced from non-fossil fuels. We conduct a study on the potential for reducing global energy-related CO2 emissions from electricity production through simple benchmarking. This is performed based on the last four performance indicators and the construction of a cumulative curve for each of these indicators. It is found that global CO2 emissions from electricity production would be reduced by 19% if all these indicators are benchmarked at the 50th percentile. Not surprisingly, the emission reduction potential measured in absolute terms is the highest for large countries such as China, India, Russia and the United States. When the potential is expressed as a percentage of a country's own emissions, few of these countries appear in the top-five list.

Suggested Citation

  • Ang, B.W. & Zhou, P. & Tay, L.P., 2011. "Potential for reducing global carbon emissions from electricity production--A benchmarking analysis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(5), pages 2482-2489, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:39:y:2011:i:5:p:2482-2489
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301-4215(11)00089-9
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Park, Hojeong & Lim, Jaekyu, 2009. "Valuation of marginal CO2 abatement options for electric power plants in Korea," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 1834-1841, May.
    2. Graus, Wina & Worrell, Ernst, 2009. "Trend in efficiency and capacity of fossil power generation in the EU," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(6), pages 2147-2160, June.
    3. Khatib, Hisham, 2010. "Review of OECD study into "Projected costs of generating electricity--2010 Edition"," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(10), pages 5403-5408, October.
    4. Maruyama, Naoko & Eckelman, Matthew J., 2009. "Long-term trends of electric efficiencies in electricity generation in developing countries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 1678-1686, May.
    5. Cai, Wenjia & Wang, Can & Chen, Jining, 2010. "Revisiting CO2 mitigation potential and costs in China's electricity sector," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(8), pages 4209-4213, August.
    6. Ang, B. W., 1987. "A cross-sectional analysis of energy--output correlation," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 274-286, October.
    7. Graus, W.H.J. & Voogt, M. & Worrell, E., 2007. "International comparison of energy efficiency of fossil power generation," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(7), pages 3936-3951, July.
    8. Ko, Fu-Kuang & Huang, Chang-Bin & Tseng, Pei-Ying & Lin, Chung-Han & Zheng, Bo-Yan & Chiu, Hsiu-Mei, 2010. "Long-term CO2 emissions reduction target and scenarios of power sector in Taiwan," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 288-300, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chen, Jiandong & Cheng, Shulei & Song, Malin & Wu, Yinyin, 2016. "A carbon emissions reduction index: Integrating the volume and allocation of regional emissions," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 1154-1164.
    2. Wang, Yongpei & Li, Jun, 2019. "Spatial spillover effect of non-fossil fuel power generation on carbon dioxide emissions across China's provinces," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 317-330.
    3. Zhang, Yue-Jun & Hao, Jun-Fang & Song, Juan, 2016. "The CO2 emission efficiency, reduction potential and spatial clustering in China’s industry: Evidence from the regional level," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 174(C), pages 213-223.
    4. Goh, Tian & Ang, B.W. & Su, Bin & Wang, H., 2018. "Drivers of stagnating global carbon intensity of electricity and the way forward," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 149-156.
    5. Ang, B.W. & Su, Bin, 2016. "Carbon emission intensity in electricity production: A global analysis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 56-63.
    6. De Oliveira-De Jesus, Paulo M., 2019. "Effect of generation capacity factors on carbon emission intensity of electricity of Latin America & the Caribbean, a temporal IDA-LMDI analysis," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 516-526.
    7. Yu, Shiwei & Zhang, Junjie & Zheng, Shuhong & Sun, Han, 2015. "Provincial carbon intensity abatement potential estimation in China: A PSO–GA-optimized multi-factor environmental learning curve method," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 46-55.
    8. Wang, Bangjun & Ji, Feng & Zheng, Jie & Xie, Kejia & Feng, Zhaolei, 2021. "Carbon emission reduction of coal-fired power supply chain enterprises under the revenue sharing contract: Perspective of coordination game," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    9. Michas, Serafeim & Stavrakas, Vassilis & Papadelis, Sotiris & Flamos, Alexandros, 2020. "A transdisciplinary modeling framework for the participatory design of dynamic adaptive policy pathways," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    10. Liu, Yang & Dong, Kangyin & Wang, Jianda & Taghizadeh-Hesary, Farhad, 2023. "Towards sustainable development goals: Does common prosperity contradict carbon reduction?," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 70-88.
    11. Lin, Boqiang & Sai, Rockson, 2021. "A multi factor Malmquist CO2emission performance indices: Evidence from Sub Saharan African public thermal power plants," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 223(C).
    12. Nabavieh, Alireza & Gholamiangonabadi, Davoud & Ahangaran, Ali Asghar, 2015. "Dynamic changes in CO2 emission performance of different types of Iranian fossil-fuel power plants," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(PA), pages 142-150.
    13. Zhang, Ning & Wang, Bing & Liu, Zhu, 2016. "Carbon emissions dynamics, efficiency gains, and technological innovation in China's industrial sectors," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 10-19.
    14. Ang, B.W. & Goh, Tian, 2016. "Carbon intensity of electricity in ASEAN: Drivers, performance and outlook," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 170-179.
    15. Wang, Ning & Wen, Zongguo & Liu, Mingqi & Guo, Jie, 2016. "Constructing an energy efficiency benchmarking system for coal production," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 169(C), pages 301-308.
    16. Malin Song & Kuangnan Fang & Jing Zhang & Jianbin Wu, 2019. "The Co-movement Between Chinese Oil Market and Other Main International Oil Markets: A DCC-MGARCH Approach," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 54(4), pages 1303-1318, December.
    17. Wang, Nannan & Chen, Ji & Yao, Shengnan & Chang, Yen-Chiang, 2018. "A meta-frontier DEA approach to efficiency comparison of carbon reduction technologies on project level," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 82(P3), pages 2606-2612.
    18. Karmellos, M. & Kosmadakis, V. & Dimas, P. & Tsakanikas, A. & Fylaktos, N. & Taliotis, C. & Zachariadis, T., 2021. "A decomposition and decoupling analysis of carbon dioxide emissions from electricity generation: Evidence from the EU-27 and the UK," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 231(C).
    19. Goh, Tian & Ang, B.W. & Xu, X.Y., 2018. "Quantifying drivers of CO2 emissions from electricity generation – Current practices and future extensions," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 231(C), pages 1191-1204.
    20. Ihtisham ul Haq & Bakhitbay Embergenov & Piratdin Allayarov, 2022. "Nexus between Sources of Electricity Production and Environmental Degradation in Context of EKC Hypothesis: A Time Series Study for Pakistan," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 12(1), pages 436-443.
    21. Chaturvedi, Vaibhav & Clarke, Leon & Edmonds, James & Calvin, Katherine & Kyle, Page, 2014. "Capital investment requirements for greenhouse gas emissions mitigation in power generation on near term to century time scales and global to regional spatial scales," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 267-278.
    22. Shiping Ma & Qianqian Liu & Wenzhong Zhang, 2022. "Examining the Effects of Installed Capacity Mix and Capacity Factor on Aggregate Carbon Intensity for Electricity Generation in China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(6), pages 1-17, March.
    23. Zhou, P. & Ang, B.W. & Wang, H., 2012. "Energy and CO2 emission performance in electricity generation: A non-radial directional distance function approach," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 221(3), pages 625-635.
    24. Ling, Yantao & Xia, Senmao & Cao, Mengqiu & He, Kerun & Lim, Ming K. & Sukumar, Arun & Yi, Huiyong & Qian, Xiaoduo, 2021. "Carbon emissions in China's thermal electricity and heating industry: an input-output structural decomposition analysis," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112930, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Graus, Wina & Worrell, Ernst, 2011. "Methods for calculating CO2 intensity of power generation and consumption: A global perspective," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(2), pages 613-627, February.
    2. Lin, Boqiang & Sai, Rockson, 2021. "A multi factor Malmquist CO2emission performance indices: Evidence from Sub Saharan African public thermal power plants," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 223(C).
    3. Zhang, Ning & Zhou, P. & Choi, Yongrok, 2013. "Energy efficiency, CO2 emission performance and technology gaps in fossil fuel electricity generation in Korea: A meta-frontier non-radial directional distance functionanalysis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 653-662.
    4. Zhou, P. & Ang, B.W. & Wang, H., 2012. "Energy and CO2 emission performance in electricity generation: A non-radial directional distance function approach," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 221(3), pages 625-635.
    5. Ahn, Young-Hwan & Jeon, Wooyoung, 2019. "Power sector reform and CO2 abatement costs in Korea," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 202-214.
    6. Egging, Ruud, 2013. "Drivers, trends, and uncertainty in long-term price projections for energy management in public buildings," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 617-624.
    7. Ghosh, Ranjan & Kathuria, Vinish, 2016. "The effect of regulatory governance on efficiency of thermal power generation in India: A stochastic frontier analysis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 11-24.
    8. Ling, Yantao & Xia, Senmao & Cao, Mengqiu & He, Kerun & Lim, Ming K. & Sukumar, Arun & Yi, Huiyong & Qian, Xiaoduo, 2021. "Carbon emissions in China's thermal electricity and heating industry: an input-output structural decomposition analysis," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112930, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    9. Oda, Junichiro & Akimoto, Keigo & Tomoda, Toshimasa & Nagashima, Miyuki & Wada, Kenichi & Sano, Fuminori, 2012. "International comparisons of energy efficiency in power, steel, and cement industries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 118-129.
    10. Elena Verdolini & Nick Johnstone & Ivan Hašcic, 2011. "Technological Change, Fuel Efficiency and Carbon Intensity in Electricity Generation: A Cross-Country Empirical Study," Working Papers 2011.92, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    11. Nemet, Gregory F., 2010. "Robust incentives and the design of a climate change governance regime," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(11), pages 7216-7225, November.
    12. de Groot, Mats & Crijns-Graus, Wina & Harmsen, Robert, 2017. "The effects of variable renewable electricity on energy efficiency and full load hours of fossil-fired power plants in the European Union," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 575-589.
    13. Lanzi, Elisa & Verdolini, Elena & Haščič, Ivan, 2011. "Efficiency-improving fossil fuel technologies for electricity generation: Data selection and trends," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(11), pages 7000-7014.
    14. Sueyoshi, Toshiyuki & Goto, Mika & Sugiyama, Manabu, 2013. "DEA window analysis for environmental assessment in a dynamic time shift: Performance assessment of U.S. coal-fired power plants," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 845-857.
    15. Wang, Ke & Yang, Kexin & Wei, Yi-Ming & Zhang, Chi, 2018. "Shadow prices of direct and overall carbon emissions in China’s construction industry: A parametric directional distance function-based sensitive estimation," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 180-193.
    16. Chih Chen, 2015. "Assessing the Pollutant Abatement Cost of Greenhouse Gas Emission Regulation: A Case Study of Taiwan’s Freeway Bus Service Industry," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 61(4), pages 477-495, August.
    17. Zhou, X. & Fan, L.W. & Zhou, P., 2015. "Marginal CO2 abatement costs: Findings from alternative shadow price estimates for Shanghai industrial sectors," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 109-117.
    18. Dorothée Charlier & Mouez Fodha & Djamel Kirat, 2023. "Residential CO2 Emissions in Europe and Carbon Taxation: A Country-Level Assessment," Post-Print hal-03901487, HAL.
    19. Gómez-Calvet, Roberto & Conesa, David & Gómez-Calvet, Ana Rosa & Tortosa-Ausina, Emili, 2014. "Energy efficiency in the European Union: What can be learned from the joint application of directional distance functions and slacks-based measures?," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 137-154.
    20. Larsson, Simon & Fantazzini, Dean & Davidsson, Simon & Kullander, Sven & Höök, Mikael, 2014. "Reviewing electricity production cost assessments," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 170-183.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:39:y:2011:i:5:p:2482-2489. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/enpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.