Decarbonisation scenarios produced by
This is the finding of new research underscoring how global decarbonisation scenarios outlined by these energy companies show delayed reductions in fossil fuel consumption and run the risk of overshooting vital climate goals. Led by research organisation Climate Analytics and including
Scenarios are produced by public, commercial and academic institutions and project what future energy requirements, and resultant emissions, would look like. These scenarios inform planning across the globe by governments and other organisations aiming to determine how rapidly different sectors must reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The scenarios are built by predicting future energy requirements for different economic sectors, such as agriculture and manufacturing, and projecting what energy sources would be needed to supply them, such as fossil fuels, nuclear, or renewable power. These projections of the future energy mix are then used to estimate what the resultant carbon emissions would be.
Fossil fuel companies have produced their own scenarios for future world energy consumption for many decades, but in recent years they have moved to also include decarbonisation objectives and resulting climate outcomes.
However, the underlying assumptions of the scenarios to back up their claims of Paris Agreement consistency are not always clear. This makes them hard to compare to scenarios devised by the scientific community, such as those used by the
Now, researchers have analysed six institutional scenarios published between 2020 and mid-2021 and calculated what the temperature outcomes for these scenarios are, using an open-source methodology, and a transparent set of criteria to map these temperature outcomes to the objectives of the Paris Agreement.
Exceeding warming limits
The scenarios include four from the oil majors (two from
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Co-author Dr Robin Lamboll, from the
'However, it's important that we don't allow oil companies to mark their own work when providing suggestions for how the world can transition away from fossil fuels in a way that meets the Paris Agreement. It's also important to be aware of these biases when databases of scenarios like this are used to frame what is possible and what is 'radical' in terms of climate goals.'
Assessing scenarios
In addition to temperature outcomes, the authors assessed what features of the projected energy systems lead to a given scenario satisfying (or not) the Paris Agreement. While the development of renewable energy sources in the analysed scenarios is similar to that in other scenarios that meet the Paris Agreement goals, they project notably high coal and gas use.
Some scenarios offset the emissions from coal use with reforestation, but the analysis shows this is insufficient. Dr Lamboll said: 'Although protecting existing forests and afforesting more regions is good, in a world of limited land and increasingly challenging growing conditions, it is unwise to rely too heavily on forests to save us from continued use of fossil fuels.
'Furthermore, coal use is particularly noxious for health reasons quite unrelated to climate change, and should not play a role in our future even if we can grow forests or deploy negative emissions technologies to counteract the carbon.'
The study gives policymakers the tools to critically assess scenarios published by a number of public, commercial and academic institutions describing how they will meet the Paris Agreement goals.
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