Stranded on a low-carbon planet: Implications of climate policy for the phase-out of coal-based power plants

By Nils Johnson, Volker Krey, David McCollum, Shilpa Rao, Keywan Riahi, Joeri Rogelj. 2015

153 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Limiting global warming to 2 °C will likely entail the complete phase-out of coal-based electricity generation without carbon capture and storage (CCS). The timing and rate of this phase-out will depend on the stringency of near-term climate policy and will have important implications for the stranding of coal power plant capacity without CCS. The objectives of this paper are to better understand the relationship between near-term climate policy and stranded coal capacity (assuming a long-term goal of limiting warming to 2 °C) and to explore strategies for reducing stranded capacity. Our analysis suggests that strengthening near-term climate policy (i.e., lowering the global greenhouse gas emission target in 2030) generally reduces stranded coal capacity and its costs. An effective strategy for reducing stranded capacity is to minimize new construction of coal capacity without CCS, which can be accomplished by reducing electricity demand through energy intensity improvements and/or by keeping existing plants operating through lifetime extensions. Another strategy, providing emission exemptions for pre-existing coal plants (i.e., grandfathering), would eliminate stranded capacity, but also decreases the likelihood of achieving the 2 °C target. Finally, the ability of CCS retrofits to significantly reduce stranded capacity depends on how quickly the technology can be deployed.

Subfields: Economics and Econometrics, Global and Planetary Change, Mechanical Engineering

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/f7c25d4a934a6d9477bf4d0cc230f7244a2fa2cc

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Citations in the corpus

Three Decades of Climate Mitigation: Why Haven't We Bent the Global Emissions Curve? (2021, unknown): “Exacerbating such constraints, many models have favored pathways high in retrofitted and new CCS and CDR technologies, effectively limiting the level of retirements (123, 126).”
The ‘2°C capital stock’ for electricity generation: Committed cumulative carbon emissions from the electricity generation sector and the transition to a green economy (2016, background): “[26] find that the timing and rate of the complete phase-out of coal-based electricity generation without CCS will depend mostly on the strength of near-term climate policies.”
Stranded assets and stranded resources: Implications for climate change mitigation and global sustainable development (2019, background): “insufficient solar power in the winter) [60].”
Technological Forecasting & Social Change (2014, methodology): “The relationship between near-term emission targets and coal power capacity lock-in is analyzed in further depth by Johnson et al., 2014-in this issue based on the MESSAGE model results.”
Assessing carbon lock-in (2015, methodology): “may be of particular relevance to policymakers interested in enhancing flexibility for deeper emissions cuts in the future, and therefore in limiting the future costs associatedwith ‘stranded assets’ [13].”