REDUCING FUTURE CO-2 EMISSIONS - THE ROLE OF NUCLEAR-ENERGY

A study was made to analyze the potential of reducing CO2 missions and to identify important energy and technology options in future energy systems of Japan. The energy market optimum allocation model MARKAL wa s used for the analysis with a time horizon from 1990 to 2050. The ana lytical procedures were as follows. First, a reference energy system w as established by incorporating all important energy sources, energy c arriers, and energy technologies that existed already or that might be introduced during the above time horizon. Second, future demand for e nergy services was estimated based on the two economic growth scenario s, high and low. Also, assumptions were made about the evolution of im ported fuel prices, availability of energy resources, and so on. Third , under the above assumptions, the optimum energy and technology optio ns were selected by minimizing a discounted system cost under differen t carbon tax schemes, and thereby the potential of reducing CO2 missio ns was analyzed. The following results were obtained by the analysis. Without utilization of nuclear energy, the CO2 emissions can be hardly stabilized at the 1990 emission level even in the case of the low eco nomic growth and large scale deployment of CO2 recovery and disposal a ssumed. A significant amount of fossil fuels will be used for power ge neration in order to meet the rapidly growing demand for electricity. Nuclear energy, by substituting fossil fuels for electric power genera tion, is expected to contribute to the reduction of CO2 emissions. In addition, the average cost oi reducing the emissions will be substanti ally lowered compared with a non nuclear scenario. (C) 1997 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.