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Energy implications of future stabilization of atmospheric CO2 content

Nature volume 395, pages 881–884 (1998)Cite this article

Abstract

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change1 calls for “stabilization of greenhouse-gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system . . . ”. A standard baseline scenario2,3 that assumes no policy intervention to limit greenhouse-gas emissions has 10 TW (10 × 1012 watts) of carbon-emission-free power being produced by the year 2050, equivalent to the power provided by all today's energy sources combined. Here we employ a carbon-cycle/energy model to estimate the carbon-emission-free power needed for various atmospheric CO2 stabilization scenarios. We find that CO2 stabilization with continued economic growth will require innovative, cost-effective and carbon-emission-free technologies that can provide additional tens of terawatts of primary power in the coming decades, and certainly by the middle of the twenty-first century, even with sustained improvement in the economic productivity of primary energy. At progressively lower atmospheric CO2-stabilization targets in the 750–350 p.p.m.v. range, implementing stabilization will become even more challenging because of the increasing demand for carbon-emission-free power. The magnitude of the implied infrastructure transition suggests the need for massive investments in innovative energy research.

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Figure 1: Evolution of factors governing the rate of global fossil-fuel carbon emissions in the Kaya identity: M˙c ≡ N(GDP/N)(Ė/GDP)(C/E).
Figure 2: Fossil-fuel carbon emissions and primary power in the twenty-first century for IPCC IS92a and WRE stabilization scenarios.
Figure 3: Twenty-first century trade-offs, between carbon-free power required and “energy efficiency”, to stabilize at twice the pre-industrial CO2 concentration. Carbon-free primary power is plotted versus the annual rate of decline in energy intensity.

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Acknowledgements

We thank DOE, NASA and NSF for partial support of this work. We also thank the Aspen Global Change Institute for discussions during the 1998 summer workshop ‘Innovative Energy Systems and CO2 Stabilization’.

Author information

Author notes

  1. Seth D. Potter

    Present address: , Boeing, Saal Beach, California, 90740-7644, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, New York University, 4 Washington Place, New York, 10003-6621, New York, USA

    Martin I. Hoffert & Seth D. Potter

  2. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, 94550, California, USA

    Ken Caldeira

  3. Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Illinois, Urbana, 61801, Illinois, USA

    Atul K. Jain, Michael E. Schlesinger & Donald J. Wuebbles

  4. Margaree Consultants, M5H 2X6, Toronto, Canada

    Erik F. Haites

  5. Department of Geography, University of Toronto, Toronto, M5S 3G3, Canada

    L. D. Danny Harvey

  6. Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford University, Stanford, 94305, Califonia, USA

    Stephen H. Schneider

  7. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Tulane University, New Orleans, 70118, Louisiana, USA

    Robert G. Watts

  8. National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, 80307, Colorado, USA

    Tom M. L. Wigley

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  1. Martin I. Hoffert
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Correspondence to Martin I. Hoffert.

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Hoffert, M., Caldeira, K., Jain, A. et al. Energy implications of future stabilization of atmospheric CO2 content. Nature 395, 881–884 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1038/27638

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