Carmen Bunzl - Universidad Pontificia Comillas

Chapter 4. Case Study: Spain 171
instance, for electricity that is generated through wind, hydropower or solar
energy it is assumed that the primary energy input is equal to the energy
output. This puts these 'non-thermal' renewable energy sources at a
disadvantage against the other energy sources because even if they would
produce the same amount of electricity, they still would require a lower amount
of primary energy as no transformation losses are accounted for. This bias
against renewable energy becomes increasingly significant as the share of these
renewable energy sources grows within the overall energy mix.
Existing European legislation has set renewable energy objectives (in the
electricity and biofuels sectors) more on the basis of final energy consumption,
defined as the energy commodities delivered to consumers for energy
purposes, than of primary energy consumption. Therefore, Spain’s share of
renewable energy in 2005 is 8.7% of final energy; this method is used to set
renewable energy targets by the European Commission 1 .
2.2.3 Historic and projected GHG emissions
Figure 4 – 4 shows historical emissions by gas (excluding land-use, land-use
change and forestry – LULUCF and excluding emissions from international
transport), as well as the projected emissions according to a reference scenario 2 .
Both the Kyoto target and the recently proposed target for Spain by the EC 1 are
also shown in the graph.
1 In Section 2.1 and Section 3.2.1 the Commission’s Proposal of 23 rd January 2008 will be further
discussed.
2 Emission projections have been taken from the 4 th National Communication, the “with implemented
measures” scenario.
Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería ICAI Carmen Bunzl Boulet Junio 2008