Life-cycle energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions for electricity generation and supply in China

• Published in: Applied energy Vol. 88; no. 1; pp. 289 - 297
• Main Authors: Ou, Xunmin, Xiaoyu, Yan, Zhang, Xiliang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Kidlington Elsevier Ltd 2011; Elsevier
• Series: Applied Energy
• Subjects: Air pollution; Air pollution caused by fuel industries; Applied sciences; carbon; Carbon dioxide; CCS; China; coal; Economic data; Electric energy; Electricity; Electricity supply; Emissions control; Energy; Energy consumption; Energy economics; energy use and consumption; Energy. Thermal use of fuels; Exact sciences and technology; General, economic and professional studies; General. Regulations. Norms. Economy; Greenhouse effect; Greenhouse gas; greenhouse gas emissions; greenhouse gases; Life-cycle analysis; Life-cycle analysis Greenhouse gas Power generation Electricity supply CCS China; nuclear power; Power generation; Renewable energy; renewable energy sources; China; China, People's Rep; CCS; Electricity supply; Greenhouse gas; China; Power generation; Life-cycle analysis
• ISSN: 0306-2619; 1872-9118
• DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2010.05.010

The Well-to-Meter (WTM) analysis module in the Tsinghua-CA3EM model has been used to examine the primary fossil energy consumption (PFEC) and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for electricity generation and supply in China. The results show that (1) the WTM PFEC and GHG emission intensities for the 2007 Chinese electricity mix are 3.247
MJ/MJ and 297.688
g carbon dioxide of equivalent (gCO
2,
e
)/MJ, respectively; (2) power generation is the main contributing sub-stage; (3) the coal-power pathway is the only major contributor of PFEC (96.23%) and GHG emissions (97.08%) in the 2007 mix; and (4) GHG emissions intensity in 2020 will be reduced to 220.470
gCO
2,
e
/MJ with the development of nuclear and renewable energy and to 169.014
gCO
2,
e
/MJ if carbon dioxide capture and storage (CCS) technology is employed. It is concluded that (1) the current high levels of PFEC and GHG emission for electricity in China are largely due to the dominant role of coal in the power-generation sector and the relatively low efficiencies during all the sub-stages from resource extraction to final energy consumption and (2) the development of nuclear and renewable energy as well as low carbon technologies such as CCS can significantly reduce GHG emissions from electricity.