Historical diffusion of nuclear, wind and solar power in different national contexts: implications for climate mitigation pathways

V. Vinichenko, J. Jewell, J. Jacobsson, A. Cherp. (2023). Historical diffusion of nuclear, wind and solar power in different national contexts: implications for climate mitigation pathways. Environmental Research Letters 18, 094066. Open Access. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/acf47a

Climate change mitigation requires rapid expansion of low-carbon electricity but there is a disagreement on whether available technologies such as renewables and nuclear power can be scaled up sufficiently fast. Here we analyze the diffusion of nuclear (from the 1960s), as well as wind and solar (from the 1980–90s) power. We show that all these technologies have been adopted in most large economies except major energy exporters, but solar and wind have diffused across countries faster and wider than nuclear. After the initial adoption, the maximum annual growth for nuclear power has been 2.6% of national electricity supply (IQR 1.3%–6%), for wind − 1.1% (0.6%–1.7%), and for solar − 0.8% (0.5%–1.3%). The fastest growth of nuclear power occurred in Western Europe in the 1980s, a response by industrialized democracies to the energy supply crises of the 1970s. The European Union (EU), currently experiencing a similar energy supply shock, is planning to expand wind and solar at similarly fast rates. This illustrates that national contexts can impact the speed of technology diffusion at least as much as technology characteristics like cost, granularity, and complexity. In the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change mitigation pathways, renewables grow much faster than nuclear due to their lower projected costs, though empirical evidence does not show that the cost is the sole factor determining the speed of diffusion. We demonstrate that expanding low-carbon electricity in Asia in line with the 1.5 °C target requires growth of nuclear power even if renewables increase as fast as in the most ambitious EU's plans. 2 °C-consistent pathways in Asia are compatible with replicating China's nuclear power plans in the whole region, while simultaneously expanding renewables as fast as in the near-term projections for the EU. Our analysis demonstrates the usefulness of empirically-benchmarked feasibility spaces for future technology projections.

The politics of energy security

J. Jewell & E. Brutschin. (2019). The politics of energy security. I: K. Hancock & J. Allison (Eds.). The Oxford Handbook of Energy Politics, 247-274. Gated. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190861360.013.10.

Energy security has long been a main driver of energy policies, but its meaning has been contested by policy makers and scholars. The concept incorporates both material and intersubjective aspects, finding different expressions in different contexts and attracting the interest of diverse social actors and academic communities. This chapter identifies, compares, and contrasts five major approaches for analyzing energy security rooted in different scholarly traditions. It argues that in order to facilitate a dialogue among these approaches as well as policy comparison and learning, it is useful to conceptualize energy security as “low vulnerability of vital energy systems.” This definition opens avenues for productive research, unpacking the interplay between material and intersubjective aspects of “vulnerability” and “vitality” of energy systems. Future research should investigate the role of material factors alongside power, values, and trust in defining energy security; explain the gap between energy securitization and action; and explore the interaction between energy security and other energy policy goals.

Comparison and interactions between the long-term pursuit of energy independence and climate policies

J. Jewell, V. Vinichenko, D. McCollum, N. Bauer, K. Riahi, T. Aboumahboub, O. Fricko, M. Harmsen, T. Kober, V. Krey, G. Marangoni, M. Tavoni, D.P. Van Vuuren, B. Van Der Zwaan & A. Cherp. (2016). Comparison and interactions between the long-term pursuit of energy independence and climate policies. Nature Energy 1, 1-9. Gated. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nenergy.2016.73.

Ensuring energy security and mitigating climate change are key energy policy priorities. The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Working Group III report emphasized that climate policies can deliver energy security as a co-benefit, in large part through reducing energy imports. Using five state-of-the-art global energy-economy models and eight long- term scenarios, we show that although deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions would reduce energy imports, the reverse is not true: ambitious policies constraining energy imports would have an insignificant impact on climate change. Restricting imports of all fuels would lower twenty-first-century emissions by only 2–15% against the Baseline scenario as compared with a 70%reduction in a 450 stabilization scenario. Restricting only oil imports would have virtually no impact on emissions. The modelled energy independence targets could be achieved at policy costs comparable to those of existing climate pledges but a fraction of the cost of limiting global warming to 2 ◦ C.

Global energy security under different climate policies, GDP growth rates and fossil resource availabilities

A. Cherp, J. Jewell, V. Vinichenko, N. Bauer & E. D. Cian. (2016). Global energy security under different climate policies, GDP growth rates and fossil resource availabilities. Climatic Change, 136 (1), 83-94. Open Access. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-013-0950-x.

Energy security is one of the main drivers of energy policies. Understanding energy security implications of long-term scenarios is crucial for informed policy making, especially with respect to transformations of energy systems required to stabilize climate change. This paper evaluates energy security under several global energy scenarios, modeled in the REMIND and WITCH integrated assessment models. The paper examines the effects of long-term climate policies on energy security under different assumptions about GDP growth and fossil fuel availability. It uses a systematic energy security assessment framework and a set of global and regional indicators for risks associated with energy trade and resilience associated with diversity of energy options. The analysis shows that climate policies significantly reduce the risks and increase the resilience of energy systems in the first half of the century. Climate policies also make energy supply, energy mix, and energy trade less dependent upon assumptions of fossil resource availability and GDP growth, and thus more predictable than in the baseline scenarios.

The concept of energy security: beyond the 4 A’s

A. Cherp, & J. Jewell. (2014). The concept of energy security: beyond the four A’s. Energy Policy, 75, 415-421. Open Access. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2014.09.005.

Energy security studies have expanded from their classic beginnings following the 1970s oil crises to encompass various energy sectors and increasingly diverse issues. This viewpoint contributes to the re-examination of the meaning of energy security that has accompanied this expansion. Our starting point is that energy security is an instance of security in general and thus any concept of it should address three questions: “Security for whom?”, “Security for which values?” and “Security from what threats?” We examine an influential approach - the ‘four As of energy security’ (availability, accessibility, affordability, and acceptability) and related literature of energy security - to show it does not address these questions. We subsequently summarize recent insights which propose a different concept of energy security as ‘low vulnerability of vital energy systems’. This approach opens the road for detailed exploration of vulnerabilities as a combination of exposure to risks and resilience and of the links between vital energy systems and critical social functions. The examination of energy security framed by this concept involves several scientific disciplines and provides a useful platform for scholarly analysis and policy learning.

Securitization of energy supply chains in China

G. C. Leung, A. Cherp, J. Jewell & Y.-M. Wei. (2014). Securitization of energy supply chains in China. Applied Energy, 123, 316-326. Gated. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2013.12.016.

Three sources of energy security risks, namely sovereignty, robustness and resilience, affect China’s energy chains. Energy security issues in China both have shaped and at the same time were shaped by ideas and institutions. China remains rigid with equating ‘security’ with ‘national security’ and the notion of “national” is socially constructed. Powerful actors, such as Chinese NOCs, inclined to interpret the problem so that it fits their preferred solution. Securitization of any energy supply chains results from their historical roots, system properties and institutional agents.

Energy and security

A. Cherp, A. Adenikinju, F. Hernandez, A. Goldthau, L. Hughes, J. Jewell, J. C. Jansen, M. Olshanskaya, R. S. de Oliveira, B. K. Sovacool & S. Vakulenko. (2012). Energy and security (T. B. Johansson, N. Nakicenovic, & A. Patwardan, Eds.). Global Energy Assessment: Toward a Sustainable Future. 325-384. Cambridge University Press. Preprint.

Energy security under de-carbonization scenarios: an assessment framework and evaluation under different technology and policy choices

J. Jewell, A. Cherp & K. Riahi. (2014). Energy security under de-carbonization scenarios: an assessment framework and evaluation under different technology and policy choices. Energy Policy, 65, 743-760. Gated. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2013.10.051.

How would a low-carbon energy transformation affect energy security? This paper proposes a framework to evaluate energy security under long-term energy scenarios generated by integrated assessment models. Energy security is defined as low vulnerability of vital energy systems, delineated along geographic and sectoral boundaries. The proposed framework considers vulnerability as a combination of risks associated with inter-regional energy trade and resilience reflected in energy intensity and diversity of energy sources and technologies. We apply this framework to 43 scenarios generated by the MESSAGE model as part of the Global Energy Assessment, including one baseline scenario and 42 “low-carbon” scenarios where the global mean temperature increase is limited to 2°C over the pre-industrial level. By and large, low-carbon scenarios are associated with lower energy trade and higher diversity of energy options, especially in the transport sector. A few risks do emerge under low-carbon scenarios in the latter half of the century. They include potentially high trade in natural gas and hydrogen and low diversity of electricity sources. Trade is typically lower in scenarios which emphasize demand-side policies as well as non-tradable energy sources (nuclear and renewables) while diversity is higher in scenarios which limit the penetration of intermittent renewables.

Energy security assessment framework and three case-studies

A. Cherp & J. Jewell. (2013). Energy security assessment framework and three case-studies (H. Dyer & M. J. Trombetta, Eds.). International Handbook of Energy Security. Chapter 8, 146-173, Edward Elgar Publishing. Gated. Preprint.

Energy security and climate change mitigation: interaction in long-term global scenarios

J. Jewell. (2013). Energy security and climate change mitigation: interaction in long-term global scenarios. Doctoral dissertation, Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy, Central European University, Budapest.

The connection between climate mitigation and energy security is crucial for linking the global problem of climate change to national energy interests but is far from trivial. While energy security is an immediate concern of ensuring general stability of energy systems, climate change mitigation is a long-term issue requiring massive transformations. Moreover, while energy security emerged as a policy problem which only recently drew scholarly attention, climate change emerged as a scientific curiosity and only recently entered the policy arena. These different realities result in a gap between energy security and climate change research.

This thesis contributes to bridging this gap by analyzing energy security in 70 global scenarios from six integrated assessment models. I develop an energy security assessment framework which is generic enough to be relevant under radically different energy systems yet rooted in historic energy security concerns. The framework introduces the concept of vital energy systems and three perspectives on energy security: sovereignty, robustness and resilience. I use 31 indicators to test the effect of different climate policies on energy security under different assumptions of economic growth, fossil fuel availability and technological choices.

I find that stabilizing the greenhouse gas concentration at 450 ppm CO2 -eq. leads to a reduction in global energy trade by 20%–70% by 2050 and 50%–85% by 2100 compared to the baseline. Oil extraction drops from a maximum of 100% of proven reserves and resources in the baseline to 50% under climate policies. Fossil resource availability and GDP growth affect energy trade in the baseline but not in climate stabilization scenarios.

Climate policies lead to an increase in diversity of energy options in electricity generation and transportation. There are certain qualifications to these energy security gains depending on technological choices and time horizons analyzed. Climate policies lead to lower imports and higher energy diversity in the E.U., China and India. However, for the U.S. and traditional energy exporters, climate stabilization would likely cause a loss of energy exports which could significantly affect the geopolitics of climate negotiations.

Energy security of China, India, the EU and the US under long-term scenarios: results from six IAMs

J. Jewell, A. Cherp, V. Vinichenko, N. Bauer, T. Kober, D. McCollum, D.P. van Vuuren, B. van der Zwaan. (2013). Energy security of China, India, the EU and the US under long-term scenarios: results from six IAMs. Climate Change Economics, 4(4), 1340011. Gated. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1142/s2010007813400113.

This paper assesses energy security in three long-term energy scenarios (business as usual development, a projection of Copenhagen commitments, and a 450 ppm stabilization scenario) as modeled in six integrated assessment models: GCAM, IMAGE, MESSAGE, ReMIND, TIAM-ECN and WITCH. We systematically evaluate long-term vulnerabilities of vital energy systems of four major economies: China, the European Union (E.U.), India and the U.S., as expressed by several characteristics of energy trade, resource extraction, and diversity of energy options. Our results show that climate policies are likely to lead to significantly lower global energy trade and reduce energy imports of major economies, decrease the rate of resource depletion, and increase the diversity of energy options. China, India and the E.U. would derive particularly strong benefits from climate policies, whereas the U.S. may forego some opportunities to export fossil fuels in the second half of the century.

Defining energy security takes more than asking around

A. Cherp. (2012). Defining energy security takes more than asking around. Energy Policy, 48, 841-842. Gated. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2012.02.016.

The recent contribution by Benjamin Sovacool proposes 20 dimensions and 320 indicators of energy security in Asia. However, the method for identifying these dimensions and indicators – 64 semi-structured interviews – has three shortcomings. First, Asian policy makers responsible for energy security are absent from the pool of respondents dominated by academics. Second, no prioritization or contextualization of energy security concerns is attempted, leading to an excessively long generic list. Third, no disagreements between the interviewed experts are accounted for. Future attempts to define energy security based on perceptions should involve relevant social actors, include mechanisms for discriminating between primary and secondary concerns and find ways to constructively report on disagreements.

The three perspectives on energy security: intellectual history, disciplinary roots and the potential for integration

A. Cherp, & J. Jewell. (2011). The three perspectives on energy security: intellectual history, disciplinary roots and the potential for integration. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, 3 (4), 202-212. Gated. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2011.07.001.

Scholarly discourses on energy security have developed in response to initially separate policy agendas such as supply of fuels for armies and transportation, uninterrupted provision of electricity, and ensuring market and investment effectiveness. As a result three distinct perspectives on energy security have emerged: the “sovereignty” perspective with its roots in political science; the “robustness” perspective with its roots in natural science and engineering; and the “resilience” perspective with its roots in economics and complex systems analysis. At present, the energy security challenges are increasingly entangled so that they cannot be analyzed within the boundaries of any single perspective. To respond to these challenges, the energy security studies should not only achieve mastery of the disciplinary knowledge underlying all three perspectives but also weave the theories, methods and knowledge from these different mindsets together in a unified interdisciplinary effort. The key challenges for interdisciplinary energy security studies are drawing the credible boundaries of the field, formulating credible research questions and developing a methodological toolkit acceptable for all three perspectives.

Governing global energy: systems, transitions, complexity

A. Cherp, J. Jewell & A. Goldthau. (2010). Governing global energy: systems, transitions, complexity. Global Policy, 2, 75-88. Open Access. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1758-5899.2010.00059.x

Global energy systems face multiple interconnected challenges which need to be addressed urgently and simultaneously, thus requiring unprecedented energy transitions. This article addresses the implications of such transitions for global energy governance. It departs from the reductionist approach where governance institutions and mechanisms are analysed in isolation from each other. Instead, the authors consider governance systems as complex and historically rooted ‘arenas’ coevolving with the energy issues they address. We argue that effective global energy governance requires striking a tenuous balance between the determination and efficiency needed to drive energy transitions with the flexibility and innovation necessary to deal with complexity and uncertainty. The article reviews three distinct and relatively autonomous global energy governance arenas: energy security, energy access and climate change. It argues that governance in each of these arenas can be enhanced through strengthening its linkages with the other two arenas. While widely shared and supported global energy goals are necessary and desirable, there is no case for a ‘global energy government’ as a single institution or regime. The current complexity of global energy governance is thus an opportunity to establish a polycentric governance system with various parts fostering complementary approaches necessary for addressing the highly interlinked energy challenges. • The three global energy challenges – providing access to modern forms of energy to all people, ensuring energy security for every nation and minimising the effects of energy systems on the climate should be resolved urgently and simultaneously. This requires an unprecedented transformation of national energy systems guided by internationally shared energy goals focused on these challenges.• On the one hand, global energy governance aimed at addressing these challenges should command long-term commitment, determination, focus and resources with a high level of integration of energy policies across scales of governance, supply and demand sides of energy systems, and energy technologies.• On the other hand, the complexity of energy challenges calls for wide involvement of different actors as well as flexibility, innovation, openness and diversity. Nations, energy industries and communities will need to find unique solutions that work for them. No panaceas, either technological or institutional, are likely to succeed.• This combination of determination and flexibility required from global energy governance cannot be achieved within a single agency or regime but rather requires a polycentric governance system. The seeds of such a system already exist in three global energy governance arenas focused on energy security, energy access and climate change. A successful reform will need to transform these arenas by providing stronger interlinkages while preserving the unique and important characteristics of each of them.

Measuring energy security: from universal indicators to contextualized frameworks

A. Cherp & J. Jewell. (2011). Measuring energy security: from universal indicators to contextualized frameworks. The Routledge Handbook of Energy Security. 330-355. (B. K. Sovacool, Ed.). Routledge. Gated. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203834602. Preprint.

The current debate on measuring energy security is largely focused on finding the “right” indicators. In the recent special issue on energy security in Energy Policy, six of the eight articles were directly related to indicator development and energy security quantification. 1 Given the complexity of energy security, it is understandable that researchers and policymakers alike seek quantification which can simplify and cut through this complexity. However, in this chapter we will argue that much more attention should be given to the process of indicator identification and application as well as to the underlying assumptions and perspectives that shape this process. Thus our discussion starts with the inherent choices and trade-offs surrounding indicator selection which are generally inexplicit and unstated in the literature.