sectoral economic costs and benefits of ghg mitigation - IPCC

Ranjan K. Bose
fuel switching in private cars as well as in the public transportation systems such as railways
(replacement of coal-fired steam locomotives with higher-efficiency diesel and/or electric
powered locomotives).
Among the alternative transportation fuels considered in the cities of Asian countries,
compressed natural gas (CNG) in new vehicles appears to have the greatest potential to reduce
GHG emissions in India, whereas liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) vehicles are more promising for
Republic of Korea. Corrective measures to form a market are needed for the spread of such newfuel
automobiles. To facilitate the distribution of low pollution automobiles and achieve the goal
of reducing exhaust gas emissions, technical and institutional support as well as adequate
infrastructure is needed. The India study suggests modification in building bylaws by a special
committee for the introduction of CNG stations and increasing its level of penetration. Similarly,
the Republic of Korea study suggests construction of recharging stations and revision in the
existing laws on fire safety, the gas safety and the auto management. The high cost of these new
vehicles is another obstacle to increasing the customer base.
More radical technological changes involve the introduction of new vehicle propulsion systems
such as the replacement of internal combustion engines with electric motors or fuel cells and the
accompanying changes in vehicle design. More revolutionary technological change would be
represented by massive introduction of a new generation of electric vehicles, due to the high enduse
efficiency of electric cars. Another alternative is hydrogen fuel cell powered vehicles. It is
therefore important to carry out demonstration of fuel cell buses for the cities in developing
countries to study the environmental implications. These two technological options offer the
possibility of drastically reducing carbon emissions or even achieving zero-carbon emissions, but
the carbon reduction costs of such options would be very high.
Technological and economic potential
The section provides a review of the results of four-country studies in Asia (namely, India,
Bangladesh, Thailand and Republic of Korea) to analyze primarily the potential of energy
technologies to reduce CO 2 emissions in the transport sector. These studies were conducted
under the Asia Least-cost Greenhouse Gas Abatement Strategy (ALGAS) project executed by the
Asian Development Bank from 1995 to 1998 (ADB/GEF/UNDP, 1998).
Cumulative carbon reduction
Each of the four country studies in Asia has used dynamic linear optimization models that
provide the long-term opportunities for GHGs mitigation and are feasible for implementation till
2020 at the national level. For each scenario, the model chooses the least-cost option, taking
account of the efficiency and cost of the different options available to meet an end-use in
different sectors of an economy. The underlying macroeconomic factors remain unchanged
across all scenarios. The most likely scenario has been identified as the BL (Baseline) scenario
against which all references are made. In each study, the mitigation options in the energy sector
are classified into the following three categories: improvement in energy efficiency through
upgrading the currently employed technologies plus planned/committed technologies in near
future, fuel substitution, and the introduction of advanced technologies along with use of new
and renewable energy.
The optimized model results were finally used to develop the costs of emissions reduction
initiative (CERI) curves for different scenarios, with different real discount rates for each
country. Table 2 summarizes average carbon abatement costs using CERI curves for India,
Bangladesh and Thailand.
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