Carbon Commentary newsletter
1, Comparative prices of EVs and petrol equivalents. The gap is smaller but still remains substantial. Opel, a Stellantis brand, says that a new Frontera small SUV will be on sale in Germany for ‘less than €30,000’ but that the same car with an engine will be ‘about €24,000’. Citroen, also part of Stellantis, will put its electric C3 on the market for less than €25,000 but the equivalent petrol car will be €10,000 cheaper. This is progress, but I don’t think the difference has narrowed enough yet. However the threat of Chinese competition has hugely increased the speed of action from European manufacturers. In the US, GM showed a new Chevrolet EV, promising a basic model at around $35,000 for 500 km range by the end of the year.
2, Microsoft emissions rise. Microsoft has stressed its commitments to reaching zero carbon. Its key target is to be carbon negative by 2030, which is now less than six years away. But the recent sustainability report for 2023 showed the scale of the challenge it is facing. Total emissions (Scopes 1-3) were 40% higher than in 2020, while the carbon for which it is directly responsible (Scopes 1 and 2) was 6% lower than in 2020 but had risen 25% in 2023. The principal cause is probably electricity use, which has substantially more than doubled since 2020. The growth of AI is making the achievement of Microsoft’s goals almost impossible. (As an aside, its carbon reporting is exceptionally good, and seems honest, but this annual report wasn’t completely open about the regression over the last couple of years).
3, Bio-energy carbon capture and storage (BECCS) in Sweden. Microsoft’s emissions in 2023 (Scopes 1-3) were about 17 million tonnes. It announced a deal with Stockholm Exergi, a Swedish power company, to purchase more than 3 million tonnes of permanent CO2 storage over ten years from a biomass electricity generating plant near Stockholm. (About 2% of its current annual emissions). Many commentators are sceptical about whether biomass carbon capture and storage genuinely reduces emissions. The huge use of wood at Drax power station in the UK, for example, is often said to decrease US forest cover in the supply plantations. But Microsoft seems to overcome these concerns after investigating the sourcing of the wood for the power station. The station owner, Stockholm Exergi, has well-developed plans for carbon capture but the storage aspect seem under-researched. All we are told is ‘Permanent geological storage will take place in the Nordic region.’ Stockholm Exergi is also keen to tell us how much financial support the project will need. Not only will the final investment decision require Microsoft’s purchases but also future subsidy from the Swedish state and its BECCS programme and its existing support from the EU. (Thanks to Gage Williams).
4, Australia green steel. Most of Australia’s ample resources of ore are not of a high enough quality to work well with hydrogen for iron manufacture. This poses a challenge for ore sales, the single most important Australian export. A new $2bn project intending to use a higher quality deposit in Queensland is now at its early stages but has strong economic logic behind it. The ore can be easily transported to a port town that has an existing large scale hydrogen plan as well as good electricity infrastructure. The hydrogen project is planned to exceed 2 gigawatts in size and this part of Queensland has ample solar and wind resources. Iron-making using hydrogen will generally move towards places with high grade iron ore and abundant electricity. Queensland would seem one of the best places to make green iron for steel manufacture in the world. (I saw this story on RenewEconomy).
5, Hydrogen cost. Estimates for 2030 hydrogen costs around the world remain hugely divergent. A useful summary from the International Council on Clean Transportation details estimates that range from over $8 to well under $2 a kilogramme. The perhaps five-fold difference is striking evidence of the uncertainty around the future of hydrogen even a few years into the future. At under $2, the price is equivalent to around 5 cents a kilowatt hour, competitive with traded electricity in many countries whereas at the higher price hydrogen will have few possible uses. And, as I commented about Microsoft’s plans, 2030 is only six years away so uncertainty about the evolution of price is having obvious impacts on decisions whether or not to invest in production of H2.
6, Electricity for high temperature industrial applications. The last few years have suggested that electricity will be able to fulfil a much larger fraction of heating needs for industry than previously expected. Some processes, such as making ceramics, might require higher temperatures but 1000 degrees Celsius will be sufficient for many industrial tasks that currently use natural gas (and which might use hydrogen in the future). A new piece of research from ETH Zurich, which continues to develop exceptional academic work, suggests that solar thermal plants which concentrate the sun’s rays onto a small area may be able to raise the temperature of quartz to over a thousand degrees because this substance can retain heat rather than radiating it. If this approach proves practical, solar heating in sun-rich countries will be another force that will shift manufacturing away from the industrial north towards the equator.
7, Recycling of cement. A huge variety of different approaches to decarbonising cement are in trials around the world. (Much of the chapter on cement in Possible covers these alternatives). A new option was proposed by academic researchers in Cambridge. They suggest that recovered cement from concrete can be added to electric arc furnaces in the steel recycling process and turned back into the raw materials for making fresh cement. This is already done at a small scale but the researchers propose that large amounts of cement can be produced in this way. More surprisingly perhaps, the paper also suggests that the new technique will be ‘economically viable’ in many parts of the world even though it uses a substantial amount of heat.
8, Auction for hydrogen power generation. Energy poor states such as S. Korea and Japan will need to use imported hydrogen for power generation. Korea announced the world’s first plan to encourage power station to switch to co-firing of either H2 or ammonia as well as 100% use in turbines or fuel cells. The auction will target the use of hydrogen by 2028, and will provide the financing for 6.5 terawatt hours of production a year, just over one per cent of Korea’s needs. Korea’s high reliance on fossil fuel generation (still over 60%) makes the auction particularly important.
9, Quilt heat pumps. Here’s an interesting idea: make heat pumps that look good, both in their internal and external components. Quilt, a startup founded by ex-Google employees, came out of stealth to show off its attractive units. The product features easy room by room control and automatic sensors that detect when a room isn’t occupied. Internal units can be painted, or even have wallpaper added, and contain a downwards light, while the outdoor kit is far less visually obtrusive than the current products being installed. One publication even described the outdoor fan as ‘architectural’. To help give the customer a better experience, installation will be handled by Quilt itself. Sales will start in the US and Canada but this product has worldwide importance and will push the existing manufacturers into the necessary redesign of their products, and the user interfaces. (Thanks to Marcel Moran).
10, Enhanced rock weathering (ERW). Proposed routes to greater storage of carbon in soils typically go through cycles of excitement and disappointment. Interest in ERW is currently booming. Larger scale trials of spreading dust from silicate rocks, such as basalt, on agricultural soils are still rare but look as they will become increasingly frequent. Basalt dust exists in large amounts because it is a by-product of several mining activities. The French waste and water company Veolia partnered with UK biotech firm FabricNano to plan a project to spread 30,000 tonnes of dust over land near Oxford. Eventually, the science suggests, this could store about 10,000 tonnes of CO2 by absorbing the gas and turning it into bicarbonate ions. However this process will typically be very slow unless the basalt is very finely ground. But the energy used for process of grinding may generate CO2 and offset the benefits. Veolia’s trial uses a FabricNano engineered enzyme to increase the pace of carbon dioxide absorption even on larger dust particles typically found in mining waste. And, of course, all the evidence suggests that the weathering of basalt improves fertility for agricultural purposes by adding key elements, such as potassium, to the soil.
The unexpected calling of a General Election in the UK has given me a new job for the next six weeks. I am standing for the Green Party in my home constituency of Oxford West and Abingdon. There’s no chance of winning here but we’re contesting the election to make sure the green case gets full exposure. I’ll be making an appeal to newsletter subscribers in the UK to help with funding the not-insignificant costs of fighting this campaign. Thank you for tolerating this.