文章基本信息

标题：On the climate benefit of a coal-to-gas shift in Germany’s electric power sector
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作者：Stefan Ladage ; Martin Blumenberg ; Dieter Franke 等
期刊名称：Scientific Reports
电子版ISSN：2045-2322
出版年度：2021
卷号：11
DOI：10.1038/s41598-021-90839-7
语种：English
出版社：Springer Nature
摘要：Methane emissions along the natural gas supply chain are critical for the climate benefit achievable by fuel switching from coal to natural gas in the electric power sector. For Germany, one of the world’s largest primary energy consumers, with a coal and natural gas share in the power sector of 35% and 13%, respectively, we conducted fleet-conversion modelling for reference year 2018, taking domestic and export country specific greenhouse gas (GHG)-emissions in the natural gas and coal supply chains into account. Methane leakage rates below 4.9% (GWP 20; immediate 4.1%) in the natural gas supply chain lead to overall reduction of CO 2-equivalent GHG-emissions by fuel switching. Supply chain methane emissions vary significantly for the import countries Russia, Norway and The Netherlands, yet for Germany’s combined natural gas mix lie with << 1% far below specific break-even leakage rates. Supply chain emission scenarios demonstrate that a complete shift to natural gas would emit 30–55% (GWP 20 and GWP 100, respectively) less CO 2-equivalent GHG than from the coal mix. However, further abating methane emissions in the petroleum sector should remain a prime effort, when considering natural gas as bridge fuel on the path to achieve the Paris climate goals.