#International Energy Agency

[reasonsforhope]

"The prospects of the world staying within the 1.5C limit on global heating have brightened owing to the “staggering” growth of renewable energy and green investment in the past two years, the chief of the world’s energy watchdog has said.

Fatih Birol, the executive director of the International Energy Agency, and the world’s foremost energy economist, said much more needed to be done but that the rapid uptake of solar power and electric vehicles were encouraging.

“Despite the scale of the challenges, I feel more optimistic than I felt two years ago,” he said in an interview. “Solar photovoltaic installations and electric vehicle sales are perfectly in line with what we said they should be, to be on track to reach net zero by 2050, and thus stay within 1.5C. Clean energy investments in the last two years have seen a staggering 40% increase.” ...

The IEA, in a report entitled Net Zero Roadmap, published on Tuesday morning, also called on developed countries with 2050 net zero targets, including the UK, to bring them forward by several years.

The report found “almost all countries must move forward their targeted net zero dates”, which for most developed countries are 2050. Some developed countries have earlier dates, such as Germany with 2045 and Austria and Iceland with 2040 and for many developing countries they are much later, 2060 in the case of China and 2070 for India.

Cop28, the UN climate summit to be held in Dubai this November and December, offered a key opportunity for countries to set out tougher emissions-cutting plans, Birol said.

He wants to see Cop28 agree a tripling of renewable energy by 2030, and a 75% cut in methane from the energy sector by the same date. The latter could be achieved at little cost, because high gas prices mean that plugging leaks from oil and gas wells can be profitable...

He also called for Cop28 to agree a doubling of energy efficiency. “To reduce fossil fuel emissions, we need to reduce demand for fossil fuels. This is a golden condition, if we are to reach our climate goals,” he said.

Birol stopped short of endorsing the call that some countries have made for a full phase-out of fossil fuels by 2050 to be agreed at Cop28, but he said all countries must work on reducing their fossil fuel use."

-via The Guardian, September 26, 2023

[rjzimmerman]

Notes: The electricity generation trajectories for wind and solar PV indicate potential generation, including current curtailment rates. However, they do not project future wind and solar PV curtailment, which may be significant in some countries by 2028.

Excerpt from this story from EcoWatch:

With solar leading the way, renewables are on track to generate nearly 50 percent of global electricity this decade. But green energy is still predicted to fall short of the United Nations target of tripling capacity, according to Renewables 2024: Analysis and forecast to 2030, a report from the International Energy Agency (IEA).

More than 5,500 gigawatts (GW) of global renewable capacity is set to be added between now and 2030, which is nearly three times the growth from 2017 to 2023, the report said.

“Renewables are moving faster than national governments can set targets for,” said Fatih Birol, IEA’s executive director, as Reuters reported. “This is mainly driven not just by efforts to lower emissions or boost energy security: it’s increasingly because renewables today offer the cheapest option to add new power plants in almost all countries around the world.”

Based on today’s governmental policy settings and current market trends, of the world’s renewable capacity installed between 2024 and 2030, almost 60 percent will come from China, a press release from IEA said.

That would mean nearly half the total global renewable power capacity would be in China by 2030, up from a third in 2010.

“Due to supportive policies and favourable economics, the world’s renewable power capacity is expected to surge over the rest of this decade, with global additions on course to roughly equal the current power capacity of China, the European Union, India and the United States combined,” the press release said.

This decade, solar PV is projected to account for 80 percent of worldwide renewable capacity growth. This is due to the construction of large solar plants and an increase in installations of rooftop solar by households and companies.

The expansion of wind is forecast to double between now and the end of the decade, compared with the period 2017 to 2023.

In nearly every country in the world, solar PV and wind are the least expensive options for adding new electricity generation.

Because of these trends, almost 70 countries that together make up 80 percent of renewable capacity around the world are set to meet or exceed their current renewable goals for 2030.

“The growth is not fully in line with the goal set by nearly 200 governments at the COP28 climate change conference in December 2023 to triple the world’s renewable capacity this decade – the report forecasts global capacity will reach 2.7 times its 2022 level by 2030,” the press release said. “But IEA analysis indicates that fully meeting the tripling target is entirely possible if governments take near-term opportunities for action.”

[gearsandbranches]

The world energy system

The world energy system is very complex. Surprise. I´m not able to compress everything there is to know about it, and all the factors (economic, social, political...) that influence it, into one post. However, I´ll try to give a first impression.

The first distinction that has to be made is between ENERGY supply, that includes transportation, electricity, heating, cooling, fires for cooking, etc. and ELECTRICITY supply. For example the quite big amount of biofuels and waste in the first graph is based on regions of the world where the main energy that is used is open fires for heating and cooking. They are kindled with collected fire wood, animal dung, etc. The amount of oil unfortunately makes sense if you take into consideration that that includes traffic of all kinds, from cars to container ships.

Right now, the main energy sources are still coal, oil, and natural gas, but also biofuels and waste, nuclear power and a growing slice of solar, wind and other renewables supply the world with energy.

According to the IEA, the International Energy Agency, the energy supply of the world looks like this right now:

(Source: https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/data-tools/energy-statistics-data-browser?country=WORLD&fuel=Energy%20supply&indicator=TESbySource)

If we look at the electricity generation instead, the graph looks like this:

(Source: https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/data-tools/energy-statistics-data-browser?country=WORLD&fuel=Electricity%20and%20heat&indicator=ElecGenByFuel)

That looks a little bit better. The amount of oil that we use to generate electricity has gone down, and the slice of wind and photovoltaic (PV) has been growing fast. The amount of natural gas has grown, that is true, but natural gas causes less CO2-emissions than oil or coal. It´s not perfect, no. Maybe not even good. But better than covering the demand with coal or oil, that´s for sure. There is much to do, no doubt. But much is happening, too. The costs for renewable energy production is getting lower and lower. More altenative energy sources are being looked into, like tide power, which is such a small amount that it´s not visible on this graph, but neither was solar power 10 years ago.

If you´re interested in the world energy supply and consumption, you find a LOT of data on the IEA website:

Here you can choose world region or country, and energy topic and play around a bit.

If you don´t want to click on a random link on the internet (fair enough!), you can just search for IEA or International Energy Agency, hover over the link "Data" and click on "Data explorers". There is a LOT of information to be found about the energy and electricity supply, sorted by country and world region, and the whole website is a treasure of information about the different kinds of energy production, the effects on the environment and a lot more.

[solarpunkpresentspodcast]

3.3: Carbon Capture and Storage with Prof Mike Bickle

In this ep, Christina talks to Dr. Mike Bickle, professor emeritus at the Earth Sciences Department at the University of Cambridge about carbon capture and storage: methods, dangers, what it would take to deploy at necessary scale. Join us!

Conquering climate change for our survival and that of much of the rest of the biosphere calls for more than attaining net zero emissions of greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere. We also need to actively remove much of the 140 extra parts per million of carbon dioxide currently up there in the atmosphere thanks to our burning of fossil fuels and destruction of so much of Earth’s biosphere. Both…

[head-post]

2024 set to be hottest year, record for coal

The International Energy Agency (IEA) announced that global coal consumption was set to reach an all-time high in 2024, which would be the warmest year on record.

Despite calls to stop or at least limit the burning of fossil fuels, the energy watchdog expects global coal demand to reach record levels for the third consecutive year. Greenhouse gases that are causing the planet to warm would need to be drastically reduced to limit global warming and avoid catastrophic climate impacts, scientists warned.

The IEA report, called Coal 2024, predicts the world will reach peak coal consumption in 2027, surpassing 8.77 billion tonnes this year. However, the outcome depends on China, which has consumed 30 per cent more coal than the rest of the world combined over the past quarter century, according to the IEA.

Climate target failure

Although Beijing sought to diversify its electricity sources, including a major expansion of solar and wind power, the IEA said China’s coal demand would still reach a record 4.9 billion tonnes in 2024. Growing coal demand in China, as well as in emerging economies, such as India and Indonesia, made up for continued declines in advanced economies.

However, this decline slowed both in the European Union and the United States. Coal use there is set to fall by 12% and 5% respectively, down from 23% and 17% in 2023. Many scientists are also concerned that US President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House will undermine Washington’s climate commitments.

The 2024 report refutes last year’s IEA prediction that coal use would start to decline after peaking in 2023. At the annual UN climate change forum in Dubai last year, countries pledged to divest from fossil fuels. However, experts cautioned that failure to double down on the landmark pledge at COP29 in Azerbaijan would jeopardise efforts to combat climate change.

The International Energy Agency, established after the 1973 oil crisis, positions itself as “the world’s leading energy authority.”

Read more HERE

[nepalenergyforum]

Regional Power Play: Hydro Deal Promises Growth for Bhutan, Nepal, India, and Bangladesh Amid Rising Challenges

For the past few years, the countries of Bhutan, Bangladesh, India and Nepal have been slowly working towards cross-border energy trade. On 3 October, this cooperation achieved a major milestone. Bangladesh’s new regime signed a tripartite agreement to import 40 megawatts (MW) of hydropower from Nepal, via Indian territory. The hydropower potential of Nepal and Bhutan, estimated to be more than…

[todayworldnews2k21]

EV shift especially in China likely to disrupt global oil market, says IEA

The IEA is an intergovernmental body based in Paris. (Image: Bloomberg) 4 min read Last Updated : Oct 16 2024 | 10:25 AM IST An increasing shift toward electric vehicles globally, especially in China, is poised to disrupt the global oil market, according to a report released Wednesday by the International Energy Agency. In recent years, China has accounted for most of the growth in oil demand…

[edouardstenger]

Heat pumps are an incredible energy transition solution

One of the main tools to slash our global dependence to fossil fuels for heating and cooling is the mighty heat pump.Let's see in this post the why and how.

One of the main tools to slash our global dependence to fossil fuels for heating and cooling is the mighty heat pump.Installed in already efficient buildings that have received the adequate amounts of insulation and weatherization, heat pumps allow homes, offices and hospitals (and any other kind of buildings) to heat and cool without breaking the bank. The beauty of heat pumps is that with just…

[industriadepetroleoygas]

The UN Secretary-General António Guterres outlined a major new Acceleration Agenda in his message to launch the Synthesis Report, which includes:

Ensuring net-zero electricity generation by 2035 for all developed economies and 2040 for the rest of the world.

Ceasing all licensing or funding of new oil and gas – consistent with the findings of the International Energy Agency.

Stopping any expansion of existing oil and gas reserves. Shifting subsidies from fossil fuels to a just energy transition.

Establishing a global phase-down of existing oil and gas production compatible with the 2050 global net-zero target.

Speeding-up efforts to deliver climate justice to those on the frontlines.

[filosofablogger]

So You Want To Be 'Exceptional', Eh?

We’ve all heard the term ‘American Exceptionalism’, one which causes me to shake my head and roll my eyes.  It ties in with the ultra-discriminatory ‘America First’ ideology and other supremacy notions and has no place in this world.  But, it turns out there is one area in which we are ‘exceptional’ … we, particularly the wealthy in this nation, contribute more per capita to the destruction of…

[emeriobanque]

Europe was the most prominent & biggest importer in the global liquified natural gas sector in the year 2022, with the region buying considerably higher volumes than its competitors as it attempts to replace the shrinking Russian pipeline gas supplies. As per the news, EU nations acquired 101mn tonnes last year, which is 58% more than in the entire of 2021, as per the data provided by Refinitiv.

In previous years, the EU fall down to Japan and China on LNG imports but Russia’s attempt at energy weaponisation since its invasion of Ukraine has compelled the bloc to adopt alternative fuel sources.

Due to Europe’s requirements to import higher volumes to cater to its storage facilities in 2023, the global LNG market is expected to stay tight, possibly pushing up costs for gas users across the world.

“When the prices increase in Europe, Asia undoubtedly is required to expand the amount it pays accordingly to survive the competition to attract LNG cargoes,” stated Olumide Ajayi, senior LNG analyst at Refinitiv. “Europe has turned into a top-notch market.”

Read more: https://www.emeriobanque.com/news/europe-gears-up-lng-imports-as-global-competition-for-fuel-grows

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from EcoWatch:

In its new Global EV Outlook 2024, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said electric vehicle (EV) sales will reach 17 million this year — up from 14 million in 2023.

In 2024, EVs are projected to make up roughly one out of nine cars sold in the United States, one in four in Europe and 45 percent of total car sales in China, an IEA press release said.

“Electric cars continue to make progress towards becoming a mass-market product in a larger number of countries,” the report said. “Tight margins, volatile battery metal prices, high inflation, and the phase-out of purchase incentives in some countries have sparked concerns about the industry’s pace of growth, but global sales data remain strong.”

More than one-fifth of cars sold globally in 2024 are predicted to be electric, with growing demand set to substantially reduce oil consumption used for road transportation over the coming decade, the press release said.

The pace of EV sales means road transportation’s oil demand is expected to peak around 2025, according to the IEA report, as Reuters reported.

The report added that around six million barrels of oil per day would be cut from oil demand by 2030, with an 11 million barrel reduction by 2035 if countries meet their stated climate and energy policies.

By 2030, EVs are projected to make up nearly one in five cars on the roads in the U.S. and European Union and one in three in China.

[girlactionfigure]

A significant decision by the International Atomic Energy Agency against Iran

The Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency approved a decision requiring Iran to submit a comprehensive report regarding its nuclear program, its status and in-depth explanations regarding the nature of the program.

19 governors supported the demand for a comprehensive report, 12 abstained and 3 opposed, therefore the proposal passed.

This means that Iran's refusal to submit the report within a limited period of time will lay the foundation for the activation of the Snapback mechanism - stipulated in the nuclear agreement with Iran in 2015.

This means that Iran is exposed to the automatic activation of all the sanctions imposed on it before the nuclear agreement immediately. Heavy sanctions:

From that moment every container/ship/cargo that leaves Iran or enters it undergoes a careful inspection and can be confiscated (quite easily), including gas and oil.

##

In response to the decision, Iran announced this evening that it is carrying out the threat it announced a few days ago and is operating new and advanced centrifuges that it has not operated before - with the aim of enriching uranium to a higher degree and quickly.

Iran is on a collision course with the West (and not only) regarding its nuclear program.

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"Ukrainians who stayed on to work at the plant say they did so under duress. Employees report that Russian occupiers coerced them into adopting Russian citizenship and signing contracts with Rosatom. According to a recent IAEA report, the plant has announced that workers still officially employed by Energoatom, Ukraine’s state nuclear company, are barred from the site. The workforce “now consists of former Energoatom employees who have adopted Russian citizenship and signed employment contracts with the Russian operating entity, as well as staff who have been sent to the ZNPP from the Russian Federation.”

On top of that, current and former employees of the ZNPP, some of whom escaped past enemy lines, have said that Russia brutalized the plant’s dwindling workforce, resorting to torture to keep workers in line.They also report that Russia is violating international law by using the plant as a military staging ground, further increasing the risks to the facility. This claim has been supported by satellite evidence.

From the start of the war, Energoatom has objected to the occupation of the ZNPP, and raised alarms about the dangers the plant faces. Recently, the IAEA has also issued warnings about the degrading state of the ZNPP and the continued potential for a meltdown. In February, it issued a bulletin warning that the plant’s last backup external power line had been disrupted, creating a “precarious” situation. Today, the IAEA’s director general, Rafael Mariano Grossi, met with President Vladimir Putin and Alexei Likhachev, the head of Rosatom, in a closed-door session to discuss his concerns about the plant. But the agency has thus far been ineffectual in compelling Russia to cooperate, and its authority does not extend to claims of human-rights abuses away from the plant, even when they involve employees.

The result is a crisis unprecedented in the history of nuclear power. A disaster at the facility would be most immediately harmful to the people living near it. But the ZNPP is located in the watershed of the Dnipro River, which flows through southern Ukraine and into the Black Sea. If a meltdown occurs at the ZNPP and affects the waterways, experts indicate that all of southern Ukraine might be at risk for contamination.

...

In their stories of working at the ZNPP after the Russian occupation began, several sources describe incidents of detentions, interrogations, and torture. Kostiantyn Chebaievskyi worked at the ZNPP until August 2022, when he says he was arrested at the end of his shift and imprisoned by Russians. Chebaievskyi says that he was accused of communicating with Ukrainian authorities and that interrogators beat him and tried to force him to make a false confession. Other people employed at the ZNPP at the time say that cells intended to hold four to six people were used to detain up to 20 prisoners without any food, save what their relatives were able to bring on visits.

Chebaievskyi says that one form of torture involved what his captors called “a phone call to Lenin.” According to Chebaievskyi, the men would clip one cable to his earlobe and another to his finger, and then interrogate him while they turned the crank on a modified field telephone that would deliver a shock. “Everything goes dark,” he said. “All that you see is white lighting.” Chebaievskyi said that the interrogators repeated the procedure over and over, demanding to know his supposed contact in Ukraine. He also reported that some prisoners were forced to give interviews for Russian television crews, reciting prewritten scripts that were complimentary toward Russia. Chebaievskyi was released after 18 days, and then managed to escape from the city.

Other ZNPP employees corroborate allegations of abuse and torture. Volodymyr Zhaivoronok is a 50-year-old former equipment operator who says he was imprisoned for 53 days, many of them in the same cell where Chebaievskyi ended up. Zhaivoronok says Russian personnel beat the prisoners, targeting their backs, necks, and shoulders. “One is bringing you into the room, and another six people come there,” Zhaivoronok told me and my colleagues at the Reckoning Project. “They come in with batons, pistols.” He recalled that the torture room was covered in blood, and prisoners were forced to clean it. Zhaivoronok said that during one of the sessions, his torturers shot him in the side with a rubber bullet.

...

ZNPP employees claimed in 2022 that their plant also became a shield [like Chernobyl]. They reported that they heard what they believed to be Russian mortar shells launched from within or near ZNPP territory, and also saw Russian military equipment in crucial locations of the plant, including turbine halls near reactors. This equipment included armored personnel carriers and trucks, tanks, anti-aircraft systems, and rocket launchers. These sources also stated that Russian soldiers—possibly hundreds of them—have been deployed to the plant, and have complete access to spaces designated for evacuation and sheltering. These claims were supported in a September 2023 report, commissioned by Greenpeace, that used satellite imagery to identify signs of military activity in the vicinity of the plant. An accident involving military equipment and ordnance could damage the systems needed to cool the reactors, and could lead to a leak of radioactive material.

The operation of Zaporizhzhia, like that of all nuclear-power plants, is subject to international law, and to regular inspections by the IAEA, a treaty organization that reports to the United Nations. Since the beginning of the occupation, the IAEA and its director general, Grossi, have made several visits to Ukraine and to the ZNPP in particular, and have offered ongoing assistance to the plant’s administrators. In May, Grossi told the UN Security Council that the situation at the ZNPP “continues to be extremely fragile and dangerous,” and noted that the plant did not have enough staff to maintain safety measures, even with the reactors shut down. Grossi added that there had been seven occasions since the occupation began when the plant lost off-site power and had to rely on diesel generators, “the last line of defence against a nuclear accident.” (The plant has since suffered another external power loss.) In that address, Grossi asked that Russia abide by certain principles in its operation of the plant, including refraining from using it for military weapon storage."

- Nataliya Gumenyuk, "Looming Disaster at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant," The Atlantic. March 6, 2024.

[informationatlas]

"Atoms for Peace" was a speech delivered by U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower to the United Nations General Assembly on December 8, 1953. In the speech, Eisenhower proposed the creation of an international atomic energy agency to facilitate the peaceful use of atomic energy and prevent its use for military purposes. This proposal laid the groundwork for the establishment of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 1957, which is still active today and plays a crucial role in promoting the peaceful use of nuclear energy and preventing nuclear weapons proliferation. The term "Atoms for Peace" became synonymous with the idea of using nuclear technology for peaceful purposes rather than for military applications.

The logo of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) features an olive branch encircling an atom. The olive branch symbolizes peace, while the atom represents the agency's focus on the peaceful use of nuclear energy. The combination of these elements in the logo reflects the core mission of the IAEA: to promote the safe and secure use of nuclear technology for peaceful purposes while preventing the spread of nuclear weapons.