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Hoesung Lee, Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), delivered an address on the opening day of the International Conference on Climate Change and the Role of Nuclear Power, held in Vienna in the second week of October. 2019. He will review the findings of the report released a year ago by the IPCC, which featured four model pathways for limiting global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, the threshold at which most experts believe the worst impacts from climate change can still be avoided. All four model pathways included increases in nuclear power generation by 2050, ranging between 59% and 501%.

To support the low-carbon energy transformation needed to achieve climate change goals, the conference focused on opportunities and challenges for nuclear power development. To this end, organizers brought together representatives of low-carbon energy sectors, international organizations and national experts.

IAEA Acting Director General Cornel Feruta opened the conference. Other prominent speakers included Liu Zhenmin, Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs at the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs; William D. Magwood, IV, Director-General of the NEA ; Fatih Birol, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency; LI Yong, Director General of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization; and senior officials and scientists from 75 countries including Argentina, China, Egypt, France, India, Mongolia, Morocco, the Russian Federation and the United States of America.

“Nuclear power has long made a major contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and currently produces one-third of the world’s low carbon electricity while also supporting sustainable development and fulfilling growing energy demands,” said IAEA Deputy Director General Mikhail Chudakov, Head of the Department of Nuclear Energy. “We are honoured that Dr. Hoesung Lee, one of the world’s leading scientific voices on climate change, is bringing his expertise to this first-of-a-kind conference.”

Read more at the International Atomic Energy Agency, "IPCC Head to Speak at International Conference on Climate Change and the Role of Nuclear Power," by Jeffrey Donovan, August 29, 2019.

Published by Nucleation Capital in 100% Renewables, Advanced Nuclear, Carbon emissions, Climate change, Climate policy, Environmental support for nuclear, Future of Energy, History Timeline, LINKS, Politicians supporting nuclear, Scientific debate, Solving climate

The world’s carbon intensity of energy, namely the amount of CO₂ spewed into the air for each unit of energy consumed, has not budged much since Kyoto was held, 20 years ago. Even among the highly industrialized nations in the OECD, the carbon intensity of energy has declined by a paltry 4% since then, according to the International Energy Agency. This statistic, alone, puts a big question mark over the 100% renewable strategies deployed around the world to replace fossil energy. In a nutshell: Perhaps 100% renewables are not the answer.

Eduardo Porter isn't taking his eye off the ball, the way many reporters are, in gushing over the growth of wind and solar around the world. Instead, he takes a hard look at the carbon-intensity of energy, which we think is the key metric to assess for our progress in addressing climate change, along with the parts per million of CO2 that are interfering with our atmosphere.

Although the world emerged from Kyoto, Japan, with what was billed as the first-ever deal to limit emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases, we have not made a lot of progress reducing the carbon-intensity of energy since then. All but one of the world’s nations — the United States, thanks to then President Bush — committed to making concrete commitments to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels. But now, twenty years later, emissions have kept rising, along with the carbon-intensity of energy, despite the fact that the price of wind turbines and solar panels has plummeted.

"Over the past 10 years, governments and private investors have collectively spent $2 trillion on infrastructure to draw electricity from the wind and the sun, according to estimates by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Environmental Progress, a nonprofit that advocates nuclear power as an essential tool in the battle against climate change, says that exceeds the total cost of all nuclear plants built to date or under construction, adjusted for inflation.

Capacity from renewable sources has grown by leaps and bounds, outpacing growth from all other sources — including coal, natural gas and nuclear power — in recent years. Solar and wind capacity installed in 2015 was more than 10 times what the International Energy Agency had forecast a decade before."

By The New York Times | Source: Environmental Progress with data from BP’s “Statistical Review of World Energy”

Read more of this analysis by Eduardo Porter at the New York Times: "Wind and Solar power Advance, but Carbon Refuses to Retreat."

Published by Nucleation Capital in 100% Renewables, Carbon emissions, Corporate purpose, Future of Energy, LINKS, Nuclear competitiveness, Zero emission energy

All Pathways to 1.5°C Limit Include Nuclear

Wind and Solar Power Advance, but Carbon Refuses to Retreat