Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain
As the world shifts toward
renewable energy sources, some experts warn that a lack of planning for the
retirement of fossil fuels could lead to a disorderly and dangerous collapse of
existing systems that could prolong the transition to green energy.
In a study published in the journal Science, University of Notre
Dame researchers Emily Grubert and Joshua Lappen argue that fossil fuel systems
might be far more fragile than current energy models assume.
"Systems designed to be large
and growing behave differently when they shrink," said Grubert, associate
professor of sustainable energy policy at Notre Dame's Keough School of Global
Affairs and a faculty affiliate of the Keough School's Pulte Institute for
Global Development. "Ignoring this shift puts everything at risk, from the
success of green energy to the basic safety and reliability of our power."
The researchers introduced the
concept of "minimum viable scale," a threshold of production below
which a fossil fuel system can no longer function safely or economically. They provided examples of
vulnerabilities in three major sectors:
- Petroleum refineries: Most refineries are incapable of operating
normally at low capacity and likely have "turndown limits," or a
minimum operational capacity, of roughly 65% to 70%. If gasoline demand
drops sharply due to electric vehicle adoption, for example, a refinery
might become incapable of providing other products such as jet fuel or
asphalt.
- Natural gas pipelines: As customers switch to electric heating
and cooling, those remaining on the gas grid will have to shoulder the
fixed costs of maintaining miles of pipelines. This can create a
"death spiral" where rising costs drive customers away.
- Coal generation: The authors highlighted a "managerial
constraint" where the fate of coal mines and power plants is
inextricably linked. A single plant closure can make a local mine
unprofitable. Conversely, a mine closure can leave a power plant without
its specific, geographically dependent fuel source, leading to a cascade
of failures.
The researchers report that the
decline of fossil fuels is unlikely to follow the smooth, linear path often
depicted in hypothetical decarbonization scenarios. Instead, they identify a
series of physical, financial, and managerial "cliffs" that could
trigger localized energy crises, price shocks, and safety threats long before
fossil fuels are retired.
Policymakers have focused intensely
on the build-out of green energy while largely ignoring the managed decline of
the current systems that still provide 80% of global energy—a critical
oversight, they said.
"None of these systems were
designed with their own obsolescence in mind," said Lappen, a postdoctoral
researcher at the Pulte Institute who studies how energy networks grow and
shrink over time.
"None of the engineers,
founding executives, economists, or accountants involved ever imagined a system
that would gradually and safely hand off to another."
The danger, according to the
authors, is that these systems are "networks of networks." If one
piece fails—a pipeline, a specialized labor pool, or a regulatory body—the
entire regional energy support system could dissolve.
"If you are leaving decisions
about things staying open or closing to individual operators who are not
coordinated in any way, this can be incredibly dangerous," Grubert said.
How to manage decline
To avoid disruption of services,
the researchers argued that the current U.S. approach of bailouts and
bankruptcies is inefficient. They recommended four key solutions for
policymakers and energy modelers:
- High-resolution modeling: Energy modelers should develop tools that
provide high-resolution representation of fossil fuel assets to identify
when specific facilities reach their minimum viable scale.
- Coordination across
ownership boundaries:
Policymakers must establish management structures that coordinate
decisions across ownership boundaries to prevent a single failure from
triggering a cascade of collapses.
- Public management for
public need: As systems become
unprofitable, they may require significant new investments to remain safe
and reliable in the short term, while still committing to closure. Such decisions should be managed by government
entities.
- Guaranteed liabilities: Governments should create mechanisms to
guarantee the payment of long-term liabilities—"bills" due at
the end of a project such as safely tearing down power plants, cleaning up
polluted soil, or paying out pensions to workers—to ensure that declining
systems are not simply abandoned by private operators.
Without such intervention, the
authors warn, the "mid-transition" period to zero carbon energy could
be defined by instability. If the decline is unmanaged, the resulting price
spikes and reliability issues could undermine public trust in the energy
transition itself, potentially stalling progress toward meeting important
climate goals.
"We will be more creative and
more successful if we think about the process outside the moment of
crisis," Grubert said. "Focusing more attention on the behavior of
fossil systems under decline can help put timely solutions into place."
Provided by University of Notre Dame
by Renée LaReau, University of Notre Dame
edited
by Sadie
Harley, reviewed by Robert Egan
Source: As
fossil fuel use declines, experts urge planning and coordination to prevent
chaotic collapse
