Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell
Sources – Can we solve climate change without nuclear energy?
Our World In Data supported us with great insight when putting this script together. They have many interactive charts on various topics. The two we especially referred a lot in this video are the ones on energy and electricity mixes:
https://ourworldindata.org/energy-mix
https://ourworldindata.org/electricity-mix
– Over recent years more and more scientists and environmentalists have been saying that nuclear energy needs to be part of the solution to rapid Climate Change. That it might even be impossible to prevent the worst without it.
There is quite a literature on the role of nuclear energy in dealing with climate change. Energy scenarios with or without it have been studied quite extensively by experts. There is a good number of supporters, some are all in with nuclear, some more cautious about the risks and safety issues. We provided some examples below representing the stand of various degrees of positive opinion on nuclear power.
#The Future of Nuclear Energy in a Carbon-Constrained World, 2018.
Quote: “While a variety of low- or zero-carbon technologies can be employed in various combinations, our analysis shows the potential contribution nuclear can make as a dispatchable low-carbon technology. Without that contribution, the cost of achieving deep decarbonization targets increases significantly (see Figure E.1, left column). The least-cost portfolios include an important share for nuclear, the magnitude of which significantly grows as the cost of nuclear drops (Figure E.1, right column).”
#Nuclear Energy, Union of Concerned Scientists.
https://www.ucsusa.org/energy/nuclear-power
Quote: “But the low-carbon electricity provided by existing nuclear power plants is increasingly valuable in the fight against climate change. Understanding these dynamics—and weighing the benefits of nuclear power against its shortcomings and risks—is essential as we make decisions about the future of US electricity.”
#The Role of Firm Low-Carbon Electricity Resources in Deep Decarbonization of Power Generation, 2018.
Quote: “This paper presents a comprehensive techno-economic evaluation of two pathways: one reliant on wind, solar, and batteries, and another also including firm low-carbon options (nuclear, bioenergy, and natural gas with carbon capture and sequestration). Across all cases, the least-cost strategy to decarbonize electricity includes one or more firm low-carbon resources. Without these resources, electricity costs rise rapidly as CO2 limits approach zero.”
– Three-quarters of global emissions are released through energy production – including everything from electricity, to heat, road transport, aviation, and shipping.
Energy takes up 73% of all greenhouse gas emissions in 2016. It encompasses the emissions from Electricity/Heat, Buildings, Manufacturing and Construction, Fugitive Emissions, Transportation and Other Fuel Combustion.
#CAIT data via ClimateWatch, 2016.
The following chart represents a more fine-grained breakdown of the sector based GHG emissions based on the same dataset:
#OWID, Greenhouse gas emissions by sector.
– So while red meat and deforestation are serious issues, energy is the most important lever we have. Because energy is a dirty business.
Deforestation and meat production’s share in greenhouse emissions is far from small. For instance, 26% of the global emissions comes from food production including production, processing and distribution. 31% of that share stems from landstock and fisheries. Among our current common sources of protein, beef and lamb have by far the largest carbon footprint.
#Environmental impacts of food production, OWID, 2020.
#Environmental impacts of food production, OWID, 2020.
– In 2019, 84% of the world’s energy came from fossil fuels – 33% from oil, 27% from coal and 24% from gas. The worst things in terms of emissions. Only about 16% of global energy came from low-emission sources: almost 7% from hydroelectric and only 5% from solar, wind, bioenergy, wave, tidal, and geothermal combined. And just over 4% came from nuclear energy.
#BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2019.
Please note: slight deviations from these numbers may occur in the infographics shown in the video due to rounding of the decimals.
– How is this possible though? It seems that every year there is more good news about renewables, that they are cheaper than ever and account for more and more capacity.
In the last decade, there is an increasing trend in the installed capacity of almost all types of renewables. The chart shows the net additions of installed capacity each year.
#Trends in Renewable Energy, Installed Capacity, IRENA.
Costs on the other hand are on the decreasing trend, especially of solar and wind technologies.
#Renewable Power Generation Costs in 2019, IRENA, 2020.
– Around 10% of the global oil supply is burned in boilers to make homes cosy and warm.
In 2017, a little below 5 billion tonnes of oil was consumed as the primary energy source. Energy consumption of buildings has been hovering around 0.5 billion tonnes of oil in the last decade, accounting for ~10% of the total.
#BP Energy Outlook: 2019 Edition.
– We rely so much on oil and gas for driving, flying and heating that most of our energy production is much more dependent on fossil fuels than the headlines about the surge in solar panels and wind turbines suggest.
Oil dominates the transport sector and it is projected to do so in the near future as well. Actually, most of the oil we consume belongs to the transportation sector, with road transport having the largest share.
#BP Energy Outlook 2019.
Heating is the largest energy end-use. Heat used in homes, industry and other sectors accounts for around half of the energy consumption. Unfortunately it is still very much dominated by fossil fuels.
#IEA Heating Report, 2020.
https://www.iea.org/fuels-and-technologies/heating
– The only way humanity has even a chance of slowing down rapid climate change is to switch from dirty energy generation to electricity that has been produced through green technologies.
#Getting to Zero Carbon Emissions in the Electric Power Sector, 2018.
Quote: “The electric power sector is widely expected to be the linchpin of efforts to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Virtually all credible pathways to climate stabilization entail twin challenges for the electricity sector: cutting emissions nearly to zero (or even net negative emissions) by mid-century, while expanding to electrify and consequently decarbonize a much greater share of global energy use.”
– Electricity is getting greener much, much faster than energy overall. In 2019, around 26% of global electricity production came from renewables, up from 19% in the year 2000.
The share of renewables in the global electricity mix in 2000 was 18.59% whereas it grew to 26.24% in 2019. On the other hand, the share of renewables in the energy consumption was 7.39% in 2000 and 11.41% in 2019. So the increase in the energy share was almost half of the increase in the electricity share.
Electricity values for 2000:
#OWID, Electricity production from fossil fuels, nuclear and renewables, World, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/elec-fossil-nuclear-renewables
Electricity values for 2019:
#OWID, Electricity production by source, World, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative
Energy values for 2000 and 2019:
#OWID, Primary energy consumption from fossil fuels, nuclear and renewables, World, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/sub-energy-fossil-renewables-nuclear
Please note: slight deviations from these numbers may occur in the infographics shown in the video due to rounding of the decimals.
– Although things appear to get better on the electricity front, the amount of fossil fuels in our electricity mix has barely changed at all in the last 20 years. In 2000, fossil fuels produced 65% of our electricity; in 2019 it was 63%.
In 2000, the share of fossil fuels in our global electricity mix was 64.7%, whereas it merely dropped to 63.31% in 2019 (Coal 36.7% + Oil 3.08% + Gas 23.53% = 63.31%).
#OWID, Electricity production from fossil fuels, nuclear and renewables, World, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/elec-fossil-nuclear-renewables
#OWID, Electricity production by source, World, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative
– The problem is that we’ve been taking nuclear energy offline almost as quickly as we’ve been adding renewables. So in the last twenty years the share of renewables increased by 7%, but nuclear’s share fell by almost 7%. Globally in the year 2000, around 17% of our electricity came from nuclear power. It’s now down to 10%.
In 2000, we were getting 18.59% of our electricity from renewables whereas nuclear was accounting for 16.71% of it.
In 2019, on the other hand, renewables had a share of 26.24% in total and nuclear of 10.44%.
So the share of renewables has increased around 7% overall and nuclear dropped by around 7%.
#OWID, Electricity production from fossil fuels, nuclear and renewables, World, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/elec-fossil-nuclear-renewables
#OWID, Electricity production by source, World, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative
– And it gets worse. In absolute terms, the amount of fossil fuels we’re burning keeps rising year by year, because the world population and economies are growing and renewables are unable to catch up and serve the new demand for electricity.
#OWID, Energy consumption by source, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?time=earliest..latest
#OWID, World population.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/world-population-by-world-regions-post-1820
– Germany has made impressive progress in increasing electricity production from renewables – particularly from wind turbines and to a lower degree solar panels. 42% of its electricity came from renewables in 2019.
Total share of renewables in electricity production in 2019 was 41.64% with [21.47% Wind + 3.44% Hydropower + 8.1% Solar + 8.63% Other renewables], where other renewables refer to geothermal, wave, tidal, biomass and waste.
#OWID, Electricity production by source, Germany, 2020.
– But it's throwing away a lot of this progress. Wind is only making up for the decline in nuclear rather than replacing coal.
The share of wind in electricity production was 1.65% in 2000 and 20.57% in 2019. So the net increase is 20.57-1.65 = 18.92%.
The share of nuclear in electricity production was 29.42% in 2000 and 12.26% in 2019. So the net decrease is 17.16%.
Therefore, the increase in wind was just able to compensate for the decrease in nuclear power. In an alternative, no-phaseout scenario, it could have been replacing fossil fuels instead.
#OWID, Share of electricity production by source, Germany, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-elec-by-source?time=earliest..latest&country=~DEU
– On top of that, Germany is planning to phase out nuclear energy completely by the end of 2022, which pushes back the coal phase to 2038.
#IEA, Germany 2020, Energy policy review.
https://www.iea.org/reports/germany-2020
Quote: “Beyond nuclear, the government also has a strategy to phase out the use of coal-fired power generation to help meet emissions targets. To reach a broad social consensus on the coal phase-out plan, the federal government established a Commission on Growth, Structural Change and Employment in June 2018. The commission presented its report in January 2019, with a recommendation to completely phase out coal power by 2038 at the latest. As sub‑targets, the commission recommended decommissioning at least 12.5 gigawatts (GW) of coal-fired power plants by 2022 and 25.6 GW by 2030. Furthermore, the commission proposed that coal mining regions receive EUR 40 billion in transitional assistance.”
– But there are countries that rely much less on fossil fuels for electricity than the rest of the world. Almost all of them get most of their juice from nuclear or hydroelectric!
#OWID, Share of electricity production from Fossil fuels, 2019.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-electricity-fossil-fuels?time=earliest..latest
#OWID, Share of electricity production from Hydropower, 2019.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-electricity-hydro?time=earliest..latest
#OWID, Share of electricity production from Nuclear, 2019.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-electricity-nuclear?time=earliest..latest
This interactive chart plots the breakdown of electricity production by source:
#OWID, Electricity production by source, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative
– Like France and Sweden: In France, only around 9% comes from fossil fuels, while 71% comes from nuclear and 20% from renewables. In Sweden almost 40% comes from nuclear power, and almost 40% from hydroelectric power.
Breakdown of the electricity production by source for France in 2019:
Nuclear was 70.85%, rounding up to 71%.
Fossil fuels summed to 9.03% with Oil 1.49%, Gas 6.81% and Coal 0.73%.
Renewables was adding up to 20.12% with Solar 2.08%, Wind 6.12%, Hydropower 10.38% and Other renewables (biomass and waste, geothermal, wave and tidal) 1.54%.
Breakdown of the electricity production by source for Sweden in 2019:
Nuclear was 39.73%, rounding to 40%,
Hydropower was 38.96%, so it was accounting for almost 40%.
#OWID, Electricity production by source, France, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative&country=~FRA
#OWID, Electricity production by source, Sweden, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative&country=~SWE
– And while hydroelectric is an important source of low-carbon electricity, it also comes with its challenges. Take Brazil: it gets over 60% from hydroelectricity – but in drought years this makes it vulnerable to power supply shortages, which caused an energy crisis in 2001 and 2002.
In 2019 Brazil supplied 63.83% of its electricity from hydropower.
#OWID, Electricity production by source, Brazil, 2020.
(Based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy and Ember, 2020)
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative&country=~BRA
Due to the drought in 2001, water levels in the reservoirs dropped drastically causing power shortages. Brazilian population was forced to reduce their electric consumption by 20%.
#Brazilian Energy Crisis, IEEE Power Engineering Review, 2002.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/3213596_Brazilian_Energy_Crisis
#Critical Issues in Brazil’s Energy Sector, 2004.
Quote: “In May 2001, the Brazilian government issued a warning that an ongoing drought had reduced reservoir levels to the point that the country's electrical energy supply -- over 90 % of which was hydroelectric in origin -- faced significant short falls. To prevent large-scale blackouts, the government ultimately imposed stiff rationing requirements for both residential and commercial customers. Lighting for city streets and public monuments was turned off at night. Customers were required to cut consumption 20 % below the previous years' usage, or face sharp fines.”
– So it is obvious that if our goal is to reduce fossil fuel use quickly, nuclear is an important part of the solution.
#IEA, Nuclear Power in a Clean Energy System, 2019.
https://www.iea.org/reports/nuclear-power-in-a-clean-energy-system
Quote: “Nuclear power and hydropower form the backbone of low-carbon electricity generation. Together, they provide three-quarters of global low-carbon generation. Over the past 50 years, the use of nuclear power has reduced CO2 emissions by over 60 gigatonnes – nearly two years’ worth of global energy-related emissions. However, in advanced economies, nuclear power has begun to fade, with plants closing and little new investment made, just when the world requires more low-carbon electricity. ”
– The countries who use nuclear power the most, currently have the cleanest electricity mix.
If we list the countries with the largest nuclear share in their electricity mix, we see that in most cases the share of fossil fuels are relatively small.
# OWID, Share of electricity production from nuclear, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-electricity-nuclear?tab=table
# OWID, Share of electricity production from fossil fuels, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-electricity-fossil-fuels?tab=table&time=2000..latest
– But instead of building on this knowledge, we are burning more and more fossil fuels each year while we are taking our low carbon nuclear options offline.
#The future of nuclear decommissioning – A worldwide market potential study, 2018.
– But many of the old generation of nuclear power plants have high costs and long construction times, we still don’t have long-term solutions for waste management and of course, the supply of radioactive material for current generation reactors is not endless.
#IEA & NEA, Technology Roadmap Nuclear Energy, 2010.
https://www.oecd-nea.org/ndd/reports/2010/nea6962-nuclear-roadmap.pdf
– And whilst there may be flaws in old technologies, there are promising new concepts being developed.
#MIT Technology Review, The new, safer nuclear reactors that might help stop climate change, 2019.
– While these problems are not insignificant, there are equally unpleasant problems with renewables: Like intermittency. The sun doesn't shine a lot in the winter or at night, we still haven’t solved the problem of storing renewable energy at scale.
# Challenges and solution technologies for the integration of variable renewable energy sources—a review, 2019.
– It takes a lot of natural resources to produce renewable equipment, some renewable energy production takes up a lot of space or can be harsh on local fauna .
Hydropower can be an example here for the taking up a lot of space and having negative effects on the surroundings. For instance, one study showed that dammed rivers can show larger levels of erosion at the river mouth compared to the free-flow rivers.
#A natural experiment reveals the impact of hydroelectric dams on the estuaries of tropical rivers, 2019.
https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/3/eaau9875
Another study recollects the challenges for wildlife and possible solutions:
#Sanchez-Zapata et al., Effects of Renewable Energy Production and Infrastructure on Wildlife, 2016.
– There may be no need for nuclear power in countries with large supplies of hydro, solar, wind or with flexible electricity grids.
Currently, there are countries running mostly on renewables. Hydropower is generally the biggest contributor to the electricity mix in those cases. Countries like Paraguay, Albania, Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, Norway get almost all of their electricity from hydropower.
In the map, countries which are getting 80 to 100% of their electricity from renewable sources in 2019 are highlighted.
#OWID, Share of electricity production from renewables, 2019.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-electricity-renewables
#OWID, Share of electricity production from hydropower, 2020.
Other countries who get most of their electricity from low carbon sources also have mixes of other renewables alongside hydropower. Some examples are Iceland (geothermal), Denmark (wind), Uruguay (wind and other renewables) and Lithuania (wind and other renewables).
#OWID, Electricity production by source, Iceland, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative&country=~ISL
#OWID, Electricity production by source, Uruguay, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative&country=~URY
#OWID, Electricity production by source, Denmark, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative&country=~DNK
#OWID, Electricity production by source, Lithuania, 2020.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-stacked?stackMode=relative&country=~LTU
Statistics shown in the infographic in the video:
# OWID, Electricity production by source, Iceland, 2020
(numbers based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy & Ember, 2020)
# OWID, Electricity production by source, Costa Rica, 2020
(numbers based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy & Ember, 2020)
