Refine GHG emission factors by regions

[brunolajoie]

The aim of this issue is to discuss the possibility/find peer reviewed studies of a standardized approach to refinie LifeCycle GHG-intensity factors of the various power plant category per geographical zone (country, zone, region...). We don't want to re-invent the wheel, and would rather use an external, trustable analysis that uses the same assumption between all country covered.

[Dec 2019 update] We (electricitymap team and other) have published a peer reviewed paper called "Real-time carbon accounting method for the European electricity markets" free donwload here that contains in Table 1 of appendix an interesting list of GHG emission factors, LCA based, computed for each EU country.

Other interesting leads include

• the following See & download data: Read sci paper:
• http://www.reliable-disclosure.org/upload/259-D5.2_Best_Practice_Environmental_Data.pdf
• https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11367-013-0665-2
• http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aa6047
• http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032117304215

[thomasgibon]

Hi @brunolajoie, great that you mention further refining of the GHG factors and the potential addition of other indicators.

I'm a co-author of the paper you refer to, and I would be glad to provide the underlying data for the various technologies we considered. We published two more papers containing such data, to extend the range of technologies and indicators.

To complete your suggestions, we can indeed:

1. Refine the factors per region, based on how efficient technologies are (based on local characteristics that alter the load factors, such as insolation and wind),

2. Refine the emissions factor based on the technologies used in various regions (we can use ecoinvent data, which has become very spatially-explicit in its latest version, the data team did the work of associating technologies with regions),

3. For me, the most interesting would be to add further indicators (land use and material requirements come as obvious ones because they are potential trade-offs of the energy transition). There is an issue of introducing high uncertainty for certain indicators (namely, for toxicity) but indicators of direct emissions like particulate matter and smog emissions could be added.

[brunolajoie]

Thanks a lot! let me have at it more closely! I'm posting a study here so we don't forget it, which gives a breakdown at the country level for Europe. http://www.reliable-disclosure.org/upload/259-D5.2_Best_Practice_Environmental_Data.pdf

[thomasgibon]

Perfect, I think the ecoinvent data reported in this paper is excellent for the electricity map. The paper detailing the update of electricity inventories in the latest ecoinvent database is a good read: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11367-013-0665-2

I've had some thoughts on what can be achieved with the app. There are two main reasons why factors change across regions/grids:

• Intrinsic factors. For the baseload technologies (fossil, nuclear, biomass, hydro), the variation across regions is a matter of technology differences, load factors and efficiencies -> factors can be directly applied from the paper.
• Extrinsic factors. For the intermittent technologies (principally solar and wind), the LCA results per kWh are derived from the total impacts of a power plant construction, maintenance and decommissioning, divided by the plant's lifetime production, in kWh. To cite the ecoinvent paper:

Annual wind load hours of wind turbines and annual yields of photovoltaic plants are key factors for the environmental life cycle burdens of wind and solar power

...which is precisely the kind of data that the app fetches with a high resolution. After collecting data over a year, the app could eventually provide yield (load factor) data that is more accurate than the one used by ecoinvent to calculate solar & wind GHG emissions per kWh. It's probably not for now, but I would be interested in knowing whether the load factors assumed in ecoinvent and those from the app align.

And if you want more than GHG data, the full range of environmental impacts from the ReCiPe2016 can be calculated easily for each technology/region, see Table 1.1 here: http://www.rivm.nl/bibliotheek/rapporten/2016-0104.pdf

[HansHyde]

@corradio - thanks for providing this link

https://github.com/tmrowco/electricitymap/blob/master/config/co2eq_parameters.js

Oli,

There are multiple "issues" discussing the need for refinements, within Regions/Countries & within the Fuel Type definitions themselves, by the same people who are concerned to the extent co2eq are being compiled/accounted for incorrectly.

@amaurea, @brunolajoie, @alixunderplatz, @ThierryOllivero, @superlonglong, @kristianmadsen88, @KetsOne, @ovotom, @7hibault, @systemcatch

#915 - My thinking before reading through... co2eq_parameters.js is exactly how the backend is built.

#162 - same discussion subject

#196 - similar but from a different perspective (sub region calculations)

#393 - same discussion subject

#480 - same discussion subject

#484 - similar discussion subject

#787 - similar discussion occurring here too

There are likely others...

Additions of "sub"Fuel Types, i.e. Gas1, Gas2, etc., definitions with appropriate values appears very straight forward, and without a major overhaul of the system.

When the Region/Country parser is built, then the appropriate Fuel Type(s) would be included. Or as more information is gathered (updating our understanding of a Region/Countries), it could be adjusted accordingly. If we know Country X has no Gas2, Coal3, Nuclear, Pumped Storage, etc., it would not be included in the Gen Mix charts.

As I commented in #general on Slack yesterday, EM's numbers are being used in extensive academic report/paper generation distributed to thought leaders & decision makers around the world. To say the report referenced has enough followers who regularly engage in Astroturfing to discredit IPCC & the UN would be an understatement, hence strictly adhering to IPCC charts of average co2eq/kWhr is a bit ironic.

Now that I know EM backend is reporting an "average" value for Coal in Germany, when it is known Germany reports specifically 2 different types & their generation realtime, I have only one choice --> I must discount any report using data from a flawed methodology

Can you close the above "Issues" threads now that they and their contributors are all linked, and we can work towards addressing this common problem in one place?

The amount of effort required to correct this appears to be quite small & straight forward, while the improvement in data quality will be quite substantial.

If there are backend reasons for your aversion to adding more Fuel Type definitions, maybe you could list those briefly???

[brunolajoie]

Hello @thomasgibon, sorry for the late answer:

• Yes, in the future we will be able to add other variables to the map than GHG, but let's start with this one.

• Very good idea, we should cooperate with ecoinvent to improve their LCA analysis based on our identified load factors globally.

• Back to this issue: we're looking for "Lifecycle Analysis CO2eq/kWh values per country/states and per fuel type. We don't need very detailed factors per sub)categories of power plants as we don't have the production data with such breakdown. We would need a standardized approach across many countries in order to make the EMap compare regions in a fair manner.

To your opinion, which database is preferable to investigate? Econinvent? If so, would you know where we could access such data? It seems that your suggested paper only gives direct emissions, not LCA. Any contacts at ecoinvent we could talk to?

[brunolajoie]

Update on ecoinvent: 1/ It's not free 2/ "Licensee is not entitled to reproduce, disseminate or publicly display any significant portions of the ecoinvent Database or the ecoinvent Datasets."

We want to remain transparent, and show in the electricitymap the c-intensity factor used to compute country's c-intensity.

I'll contact them to figure out in detail if we can collaborate on this, hopefully we can work something out!

[alixunderplatz]

@brunolajoie I'd like to leave this chart here based on LCA for Germany. I had posted another part of this before (in the lignite vs. hard coal emission issue #162).

The study can be found here: https://www.vdi.de/fileadmin/vdi_de/redakteur_dateien/geu_dateien/FB4-Internetseiten/CO2-Emissionen%20der%20Stromerzeugung_01.pdf

It was released 2007. There are many examples per production type and several sources given.

• For fossil and hydro generation, numbers will still be valid.
• As the majority of PV was installed between 2009-2013 after the relase of the study, I'd stick with IPCC for that category (as well as for the rest of renewables)

[brunolajoie]

Thanks. Same remark than for moldova: lets keep that in mind if we don't find standardized approach valid for all ocuntries.

[thomasgibon]

@brunolajoie

On the database. Ecoinvent is probably the best reference in terms of life cycle inventory databases. As you remarked, it is unfortunately not free BUT I am sure we (e.g., I) can compile life-cycle factors for the electricity-producing processes that can be found in ecoinvent without infringing the copyright issue, as long as (1) we don't disclose the disaggregated inventory data (i.e. only one number per kWh, without detail on the impact contribution) and (2) we remain reasonable in how much data we extract (I guess ~100 technologies would be fine, the database contains >15000 processes). The best would be to get in touch with the ecoinvent people, I can suggest Christian Bauer and Laurent Vandepaer, who are working on refining the electricity inventories for the next ecoinvent version.

On direct emissions. You are right, the regional detail is for direct emissions only, I think the assumption is that all plants are built and decommissioned in the same way everywhere, so the variable share is only the direct emissions. The contribution from infrastructure is usually very low as long as we only look at CO2 (see below the detail for 1 kWh from coal).

@alixunderplatz We have made the same comparison for my PhD thesis work, see Papers III and IV here: https://brage.bibsys.no/xmlui/handle/11250/2469193

Especially:

...for CO2:

and for other environmental impacts:

[brunolajoie]

Great news @thomasgibon. I've contacted ecoinvent last week through their contact-us generic email, (no answer yet) and would be happy to try again if you could give me in private the contacts of Christian Bauer and Laurent Vandepaer that you mentioned. Else i'll try to find them online thanks!

[thomasgibon]

@brunolajoie I actually talked to Laurent yesterday, who said he'd contact you directly. He's a PhD student working with marginal electricity mix data in ecoinvent, and Christian Bauer is one of his supervisors.

[brunolajoie]

Thanks! I'm in discussion with Econinvent. Will let you know

[alixunderplatz]

The following document comes from the scientific service of the German parliament and is a collection of carbon emission factors for different generation types (it's from 2007!).

https://www.bundestag.de/blob/406432/70f77c4c170d9048d88dcc3071b7721c/wd-8-056-07-pdf-data.pdf

I want to point at the chart on page 25. It is a list of related emissions from nuclear power plants. It says that emissions highly depend on where (country) and how (process) the uranium enrichment took place before delivery to the NPP. France mainly uses domestic "nuclear" electricity for this process, so CO2eq is at 8 g/kWh for NPPs using French fuel elements. For South African uranium fuel it is at 125 g/kWh, because of high coal share in their electricity mix and using a more energy consuming process for uranium enrichment.

[brunolajoie]

@thomasgibon, I'd be happy to have a chat with you about your proposed approach, ping me on slack anytime!

[comready]

For info re ecoinvent the paper https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030142151630091X I referred to in #1309 for Turkey says: "The background life cycle inventory data have been sourced largely from Ecoinvent v2.2 (Dones et al., 2007) but have been adapted as far as possible to Turkey's conditions"

[brunolajoie]

We have a new lead: The following paper "Real-Time Carbon Accounting Method for the European Electricity Markets", supplementary material Table 1,2,3, provides: emission factors for each EU country, per type of power plant, and distinguishing Operational vs. Lifecycle emissions factor., derived from ecoinvent v3

We could use it to have a more precise electricityMap for each EU countries.

As values differ significatively from IPCC's median value, we can't use them only for EU countries and fall back to IPCC for the rest of the world. That would be highly unfair comparison.

Hopefully, it also contains a EU-28 average emission factor per fuel which we could potentially use as a not so bad proxy for default emission factor of countries outside EU.

As we have a operational vs. lifecycle emission factors, we could potentially create a "toogle switch" to switch between an electricityMap with "only operational emission", and another one with "operational + lifecycle" emissions

What do you guys think? cc @thomasgibon

[thomasgibon]

Hi @brunolajoie, that was quick :)

First, I think we need to wait for the reviewers' comments and decision on the paper. I ran quality checks on this data, but third-party verification is most welcome.

Second, your proposition sounds adequate:

• if country-specific data exists: use it,
• elif country is in EU28: use EU28 average,
• else: use IPCC average.

For some technologies, the change would be pretty drastic (e.g. Finnish oil-fired power plants, which seem to be very efficient). I should remake Table 1 adding the IPCC values to have a general overview of how it would change mix results.

And third, the total vs. operational (vs. direct?) toggle would be great to see! A remark, I went back to look at the IPCC CO2/kWh figure, they make the split direct/indirect (supply chain + infrastructure):

[brunolajoie]

Thanks Thomas.

I'm not comfortable mixing using IPCC average for non-EU country, and ecoinvent-derived data for EU countries. The methodology and underlying assumption would be very different.

Ideally, what we would have needed is a Global Average emission factors using the same methodology that was used in the paper to compute EU-28 average.

If we don't have that, what do you think about using the paper's EU-28 average for NON-EU countries?

[thomasgibon]

Very good point, it would work if we used the lifecycle numbers only.

However, the IPCC also provides a rough breakdown of these emissions in Table A.III.2 of AR5 WGIII: https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/ipcc_wg3_ar5_annex-iii.pdf

The split is direct/indirect, though, meaning that all low-carbon sources have "0" direct emissions. Maybe show the lifecycle numbers by default, and when switching to "operations" or "direct" show only the countries that have this data?

[brunolajoie]

Table A.III.2 is already what we use. However you see it's not "global coal average" but only "Pulverized coal PC", which makes this 820 a bit low for the electricityMap.

I'm not sure to understand your first sentence?

[systemcatch]

Quoting @erdmark in #1765

On your site coal has a carbon intensity of 820g/kWh in Germany. I think it is a bit higher. In Germany there are two types of coal burned, normal hard coal with ~870 and lignite coal with ~1130g. The data is from energy-charts.de for 2016. I divided CO2 emissions by generated power over the whole year. The weighted average of both types 1020, much higher than what electricitymap calculates with. Climate impact could be even worse, because this is only co2 without methane emissions. You can see the calculation, data source and data from 2007 to 2016 in the attachment.

CO2GrammKohle.xlsx

[comready]

I like the idea of having a toggle switch between lifecycle and operational. I presume the operational figures are much more accurate than the lifecycle ones? Certainly a couple of years ago here in Turkey methane emissions from coal mining were the least certain figures in the country's ghg emissions. I don't know if that is still true and whether they are also very uncertain in other coal mining countries. So having a toggle switch might enable people to choose between a very uncertain lifecycle figure and a reasonably accurate operational figure?

[brunolajoie]

Yes, the idea of the toogle switch would be awesome. As discussed above we're waiting for the peer review of the following paper which could provide such figures. We would be able to have the Lifecycle vs. Operation emissions, splitted by EU-country, and use EU-28 average as default value to all non-EU countries in the eMap. cc @thomasgibon

[thomasgibon]

I concur, great idea. I don't think we have heard back from the reviewers yet.

The main criticism I am awaiting from the review is the relevance of separating indirect (i.e. not on-site, such as coal mining, logistics, ...) vs. direct (e.g. direct emissions from combustion) emissions, as opposed to what is done in the paper, i.e. separating infrastructure (i.e. invested capital, namely construction of plants and mines) vs. operation (which includes mining activities and transportation). For renewables this distinction is almost unnecessary (infrastructure emissions ~ indirect emissions) but for coal or gas, should extraction be part of infrastructure or operation? What would be the most informative to the electricity map users? As long as this is clearly explained, I see no issue using one or the other.

@erdmark in the paper we find emissions of 1170 g CO2 eq./kWh average for German coal plants (so not only CO2), which seems to fit the data from energy-charts.de

[brunolajoie]

@thomasgibon I personally like very much the split in the paper (operational vs. non-operational emissions. One is clearly per kWh. The other depends on the lifetime & load factor of the power plant). What would be the split closer to scope 2 vs. scope 3 GHG accounting? Let's wait for the reviews!

[brunolajoie]

The paper is now peer-reviewed and published here We shall be able to use it to finally update our default emission factor per country, using table 1 from supplementary material

What we could do, as a suggestion, is

1. Update emission factors for each EU country based on table 1
2. Update the default fallback emission factor to that or EU-28 average
3. Make sure to also recompute manually some "unknown" values that were computed based on assumptions of a static fuel mix
4. Make sure to adjust the color scale because figures will be 30% higher in average
5. Re-compute all historical carbon intensity values in our database to maintain continuity

We can leave for another issue the distinction between operational vs. non-operational (to make things a bit clearer).

Does this seems reasonable to you guys?

[jarek]

Bruno's most recent comment here https://github.com/tmrowco/electricitymap-contrib/issues/738#issuecomment-499397532 has a table of carbon intensities for fuels for EU/ENTSO-E countries. It would be a great contribution to add these to corresponding zoneOverrides in https://github.com/tmrowco/electricitymap-contrib/blob/master/config/co2eq_parameters.json.

[scriptator]

The paper is now peer-reviewed and published

@brunolajoie I am confused: how can coal cogeneration values be higher than non-cogeneration? And moreover, how do we make use of the cogeneration values at all?

[alixunderplatz]

@scriptator In general, it is not really possible to distinguish between co-generation and non-co-generation from most of our data sources. In addition, there are several different scientific approaches how to account for the carbon emissions of heat and electricity from co-generation and there is no right or wrong in "how to account for it correctly". We're probably never going to seperately account for co-gen and non-co-gen for these reasons.

Trying to answer your question regarding the data table: "how can co-generation emissions be higher than non-co-generation"
(I'm not too sure, though, if it's totally correct^^) It seems, this mainly applies to coal power plants with co-generation in the table. I guess, it's because many of these co-gen coal plants in Europe are "operated by electricity demand". In winter times with additional heat demand, you will often withdraw hot steam from the thermodynamic cycle, which is not able to contribute to electricity generation anymore. Waste heat from the process might not be sufficient enough to cover the heat demand during the heating period. Therefore, you will use more fuel to acchieve the nominal electricity output of your generator plus to cover the greater heat demand. When accounting the "emissions of fuel used per kWh electricity output", you might end up with a higher intensity than before. Depends on the method of accounting as well.

[brunolajoie]

These figure were derived from ecoinvent Database. @thomasgibon might know the exact answer!