Technological trajectories for a low carbon future
Résumé
Challenges for energy and climate change involve evolution of the world energy system, especially of the technological mix permitting to satisfy the energy demands. Different pathways to achieve a low-carbon economy are analyzed, in line with emissions targets expressed under the aegis of the UNFCCC climate negotiations and, according to several assumptions about technologies availability and cost, energy sources potential. This research is developed with TIAM-FR, a bottom-up optimization model describing the world energy system in great detail of current and future technologies distributed by region (15) and sector (6) on the time horizon 2005-2100. The analysis of the scenario results focuses on the effect of climate objectives on GHG emissions, on the energy mix and on future technological investments, as the place of fossil fuels, investments in renewable and CCS technologies, and costs of such investments. In a global perspective, the evolution of the technological mix involved by the search of low carbon economies appeal a discussion as regard the feasibility of this development. For example, concerning the deployment ofCCS and renewable technologies, we still face technological and economic limits in term of infrastructures, of stability and security of power systems, of costs and scale of investments, of social acceptability. Geological storage of CO2 is opening new options for energy development. But it should not discourage the development of alternatives, including energy savings and renewable energy. For each region, costs and the most promising technologies to reach this target are different. Moreover, regional differences exist in terms of existing energy system and infrastructure, technological potential (renewable energies, CCS, nuclear) or future economic development and priorities. We show for example the different weights of the mitigation effort for developing countries by comparison with developed regions.