Wina H.J. Crijns-Graus

Utrecht University | UU · Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development

This study addresses the oversight in the climate change impacts on power system planning for carbon neutrality. We enhance the China's Climate Change Integrated Assessment/National Energy Technology (C3IAM/NET) Power model with meteorological big data, and model climate change impacts on power demand and supply. The regional power technology pathw...

The coal-dominated electricity system, alongside increasing industrial electricity demand, places China into a dilemma between industrialization and environmental impacts. A practical solution is to exploit air quality and health cobenefits of industrial energy efficiency measures, which has not yet been integrated into China’s energy transition st...

The decarbonisation of the iron and steel industry is expected to significantly increase its electricity consumption due to higher levels of electrification and the partial shift to hydrogen as iron reductant. With its batch processes, this industry offers large potential for the application of demand response strategies to achieve electricity cost...

The transition of the European iron and steel industry (ISI) towards low-carbon manufacturing is crucial for the European Union (EU)'s 2050 climate neutrality objective. One emerging solution is electrification by using hydrogen (H2) as iron ore reductant, which increases specific electricity use per tonne of steel up to 35 times compared to the co...

To meet the European Union's 2050 climate neutrality target, future electricity generation is expected to largely rely on variable renewable energy (VRE). VRE supply, being dependent on weather, is susceptible to changing climate conditions. Based on spatiotemporally explicit climate data under a Paris-proof climate scenario and a comprehensive ene...

Industry poses one of the biggest challenges in the renewable energy transition. In this paper, fossil fuels in the European industrial sector are replaced by renewable energy using a novel tool, IndustryPLAN, a planning tool for the assessment of national industrial sectors. In a bottom-up approach, each industry sub-sector is addressed with energ...

Increasing the energy efficiency in high energy demand sectors such as industry with a high reliance on coal, oil and natural gas is considered a pivotal step towards reducing greenhouse gas emissions and meeting the Paris Agreement targets. The European Commission published final energy demand projections for industry capturing current policies an...

There are many promising renewable energy (RE) technologies that could help increase the contribution of RE in energy supply but which are not yet commercially available. The development rate of new RE technologies depends on many factors, such as Research and Development (R&D) efforts and policies. This study focuses on comparing China’s efforts r...

European electricity markets ensure the matching between supply and demand at all times. Due to their time-scale operations, the balancing markets are the last resources to achieve so and ensure the grid frequency. The increasing shares of non-dispatchable power capacities intensify the demand for flexibility. District heating systems (DHs) are pot...

The steel industry is responsible for a large share of the industrial energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions and several long-term energy models have some representation of this sub-sector. It is found that models, commonly use a flow-based approach for projecting steel demand neglecting that in-use steel stocks serve as a better demand in...

Industry is the largest electricity consuming sector in the world. China consumes about 25% of global electricity demand, and 69% of this is used in industries. The high electricity demand in industry is responsible for 45% of CO2, 25% of SO2, 34% of NOx and 14% of PM emissions in China. This study aims to fill the knowledge gap on the potential fo...

In many countries the role of combined heat & power (CHP) generation in the power & heat sector is significant. However, in decomposition analyses of the power & heat sector the contribution of CHP to observed changes in primary energy use or CO2 emissions is generally not made explicit. In this paper, the contribution of CHP is shown for eight cou...

Coal-intensive power supply systems, along with a fast-growing electricity demand driven by industry has caused serious air pollution and health concerns. These concerns are particularly prominent in countries where electricity use is likewise dominated by industry and heavily dependent on coal-based electricity. A more efficient industry and coal-...

Energy-intensive industries across the EU-28 release unused heat into the environment. This excess heat can be utilized for district heating systems. However, this is the exception today, and the potential contribution to the decarbonization of district heating is not well quantified. An estimation of excess heat, based on industrial processes, and...

Moving to a sustainable industry and weaning electricity supply off coal are critical to mitigate ambient air pollution and climate change. This is particularly true in China which is globally the largest manufacturer and relies heavily on coal-fired electricity. Research that explores the linkages between industrial electricity use and the electri...

Heating accounts for about half of the final energy demand in the member states of the European Union. The challenges of a transition to a sustainable heat supply vary greatly at the local level indicating the need for incorporating local data for determining solutions. Current studies vary in the inclusion of heat savings, the level of details, an...

The industrial sector is a major energy consumer, responsible for about 35% of global energy use. In this article we focus on past developments of energy use and greenhouse gas emissions in industries and for the biggest energy consuming sectors we give an overview of energy saving opportunities. We find that about 60% of industrial energy use is c...

The large-scale deployment of wind and solar, which are variable renewable electricity (VRE) technologies, is indispensable to decarbonise China’s power sector. However, variability in VRE outputs poses challenges in power system operation in terms of increased demand for backup and reserve capacity. These challenges can be effectively mitigated by...

MESSAGEix model are widely used for forecasting long-term energy consumption and emissions, as well as modelling the possible GHGs mitigations. However, because of the complexity of manufacturing sectors, the MESSAGEix model aggregate detailed technology options and thereby miss linkages across sub-sectors, which leads to energy saving potentials a...

Although the cement industry emits around 6% of global CO 2 emissions, most global Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) barely represent this industrial subsector or do not cover all important processes. This study, describes the state-of-the-art of cement modelling in IAMs, suggests possible improvements and discusses the impacts of these on energy...

The majority of energy used by the European Union has been imported from non-EU countries. The EU desires to increase its own renewable energy use to secure its future energy supply. In this paper, an assessment framework of technology dependence has been proposed that can be used to locate bottlenecks in the value chain of geothermal power generat...

Power generation from intermittent renewable energy sources in northwest Europe is expected to increase significantly in the next 20 years. This reduces the predictability of electricity generation and increases the need for flexibility in electricity demand. Data on demand response (DR) capacities of electricity-intensive consumers is limited for...

Reducing heat demand of buildings, due to legal and technological advances in the EU, shifts the ratio of operational vs. embodied energy towards an increasing share of the latter. This leads to a shifting focus on building materials (embodied) energy use. In this study the relationship between heat demand and embodied energy use was investigated,...

Although energy supply security is an important long-term goal of the eu, member states are in control over external supplies and their domestic energy mix, and an overarching institutional structure is lacking. In this paper, we focus on the availability of oil and gas and the risks of supply disruptions for the eu. The last two decades have been...

To effectively mitigate climate change, variable renewable electricity (VRE) is expected to substitute a great share of current fossil-fired electricity generation. However, VRE investments can be obstructed by many barriers, endangering the amount of investments needed in order to be consistent with the Paris 2°C target. To help policy-makers bett...

For reaching the 2°C climate target, the robust growth of electricity generation from variable renewable energy sources (VRE) in the power sector is expected to continue. Accommodation of the power system to the variable, uncertain and locational-dependent outputs of VRE causes integration costs. Integrating VRE into a well-functioning electricity...

Given the booming economic growth and urbanization in China, cities have become crucial to sustaining this development and curbing national emissions. Understanding the key drivers underlying the rapid emissions growth is critical to providing local solutions for national climate targets. By using index decomposition analysis, we explore the factor...

Energy and Environment in China and the European Union: Introduction to the Special Issue This special issue, to which eight scholars have contributed, is the result of the second phase of the joint research program between the Institute of West Asian & African Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the Energy Program Asia of the In...

Decentralized generation is often connected to the distribution grid and consumed by end-users in geographical proximity. Compared to large centralized power plants supplying electricity that flows down the voltage chain in a top-down manner, decentralized generation can avoid grid losses and save primary energy (PE). This paper developed and demon...

This study focused on the effects of variable renewable electricity (VRE) on full load hours and energy efficiency of fossil-fired power generation in the European Union from 1990-2014. Member states were aggregated into three groups based on the level of VRE penetration. Average full load hours are found to be decreasing since 2006 for all groups....

The industry sector is a major energy consumer and GHG emitter. Effective climate change mitigation strategies will require a significant reduction of industrial emissions. To better understand the variations in the projected industrial pathways for both baseline and mitigation scenarios, we compare key input and structure assumptions used in energ...

Actions to reduce the combustion of fossil fuels often decrease GHG emissions as well as air pollutants and bring multiple benefits for improvement of energy efficiency, climate change, and air quality associated with human health benefits. The China’s cement industry is the second largest energy consumer and key emitter of CO2 and air pollutants,...

This study explores past growth rates of renewable energy sources (1971-2012) and required future ones in 2 degrees scenarios. Results show that in spite of comparatively high growth of renewable energy in the period 2000-2012, the share of renewable energy in total energy use stayed the same (13%). The overall increase in renewable energy amounted...

Energy models, such as Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs), are widely used in the forecasting of energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and in the analysis and evaluation of the different GHG mitigation options. To construct efficient industry specific policies it is important to make careful estimations of the potentials for energy...

For many countries, the inflow of energy is essential to keep economies running. Oil is typically considered to be the most critical fuel as an input for the petro-chemical and transportation sector and due to limited and less spread reserves. In this study external oil supply risks are assessed for the period up to 2035 for the European Union, Uni...

In this study, the energy conservation supply curves (ECSC) combined with the GAINS (Greenhouse Gas and Air Pollution Interactions and Synergies) was used to estimate the co-benefits of energy savings on CO2 and air pollutants emission for implementation co-control options of energy efficiency measures and end-of-pipe options in the china's cement...

Corporate climate action is increasingly considered important in driving the transition towards a low-carbon economy. For this, it is critical to ensure translation of global goals to greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions reduction targets at company level. At the moment, however, there is a lack of clear methods to derive consistent corporate target sett...

China’s cement industry is the second largest energy consumer and key emitter of CO2 and air pollutants. It accounts for 7% of total energy consumption in China and 15% of CO2, 21% of PM, 4% SO2 and 10% of NOx of total emissions, respectively. Provincial disparities in energy consumption and emissions of CO2 and air pollutants in China’s cement ind...

This study investigates CO2 emission reduction within the EU resulting from the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) up to 2030. This is performed by constructing a baseline scenario without the ETS and assessing the impacts of the ETS, as currently designed. The results indicate that the ETS will start to impact emissions primarily after 2025 due to the...

This research explores the techno-economic potential for a predominantly renewable electricity-based microgrid serving an industrial-sized drink water plant in the Netherlands. Grid-connected and stand-alone microgrid scenarios were modeled, utilizing measured wind speed and solar irradiation data, real time manufacturer data for technology compone...

The adoption of energy efficiency measures can significantly reduce industrial energy use. This study estimates the future industrial energy consumption under two energy demand scenarios: (1) a reference scenario that follows business as usual trends and (2) a low energy demand scenario that takes into account the implementation of energy efficienc...

Although microgrids have been researched for over a decade and recognized for their multitude of benefits to improve power reliability, security, sustainability, and decrease power costs for the consumer, they have still not reached rapid commercial growth. The main aim of this research is to identify the common barriers and ultimate success factor...

Primary aluminium production is a highly energy-intensive and greenhouse gas (GHG)-emitting process responsible for about 1 % of global GHG emissions. In 2009, the two most energy-intensive processes in primary aluminium production, alumina refining and aluminium smelting consumed 3.1 EJ, of which 2 EJ was electricity for aluminium smelting, about...

eu energy policy objectives are directed at three highly interdependent areas: energy supply security, competitiveness and decarbonization to prevent climate change. In this paper, we focus on the issue of energy supply security. Security of energy supply for the immediate and medium-term future is a necessary condition in the current context of th...

The role of urban carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions has attracted city authorities' attention. Several entities face challenges when developing inventory method for local communities, due to limited data. This study proposes a top-down method to estimate CO2 emissions at an urban scale, using nighttime light imagery and statistical energy data. We fin...

The iron and steel industry is one of the largest energy users and sources of greenhouse gas and air pollutant emissions worldwide. In 2010, China accounted for 45 % of the global steel production, and consumed 15.8 EJ in final energy and emitted an estimated 1,344 Mt CO 2 eq of greenhouse gases, 8.4 Mt of PM, and 5.3 Mt of SO 2. China is facing se...

In this paper we evaluate two approaches for estimating CO2 emission reduction from electricity savings: one based on average CO2 intensities of electricity generation and another that relies on marginal CO2 intensities.It is found that the average CO2 intensity approach has a significant shortcoming when it comes to scenario-based approaches for C...

Das von der Energiesystemanalyse im DLR-Institut für Technische Thermodynamik in Stuttgart in Zusammenarbeit mit Partnern erarbeitete globale Energieszenario Energy [R]evolution zeigt nach Weltregionen differenzierte Wege auf, wie erneuerbare Energien bis zum Jahr 2050 eine sichere und nachhaltige globale Energieversorgung gewährleisten können. Gle...

This paper compares five methods to calculate CO2 intensity (g/kWh) of power generation, based on different ways to take into account combined heat and power generation. It was found that the method chosen can have a large impact on the CO2 intensity for countries with relatively large amounts of combined heat and power plants. Of the analysed coun...

To what degree are recently built and planned power plants in the EU `capture-ready' for carbon capture and storage (CCS)? Survey results show that most recently built fossil fuel power plants have not been designed as capture-ready. For 20 planned coal-fired plants, 13 were said to be capture-ready (65%). For 31 planned gas-fired power plants, onl...

The Energy [R]evolution 2010 scenario is an update of the Energy [R]evolution scenarios published in 2007 and 2008. It takes up recent trends in global energy demand and production and analyses to which extent this affects chances for achieving climate protection targets. The main target is to reduce global CO2 emissions to 3.7 Gt/a in 2050, thus l...

This study assessed technical potentials for energy efficiency improvement in 2050 in a global context. The reference scenario is based on the World Energy Outlook of the International Energy Agency 2007 edition and assumptions regarding gross domestic product developments after 2030. In the reference scenario, worldwide final energy demand almost...