Carbon Capture and Storage – A responsible bridge to a low-carbon future?

Event Type
Panel

Location/Date
Bonn, 19.06.2019

Organiser

German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE) within the framework of the Bonn Alliance for Sustainability Research


Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is considered by many research groups working on climate change mitigation as a necessary element of a (more) sustainable energy future. For instance, WBGU in its 2011 “Great Transformation” report concludes, “CCS is a necessary mitigation measure for countries that continue to use fossil energies, if anthropogenic global warming of more than 2°C is to be avoided.” More recently, the “1.5 degrees Special Report” of the IPCC comes to the conclusion that “In the majority of low-stabilization scenarios, the share of low-carbon electricity supply (comprising RE, nuclear and CCS) increases from the current share of approximately 30 % to more than 80 % by 2050, and fossil fuel power generation without CCS is phased out almost entirely by 2100.” In addition, even assumed all power generation could be done with renewable energies, CCS might be a crucial technology to avoid GHG emissions in industrial processes, reaching 7% of all GHG emissions in the case of Germany.

However, in Germany, one of the globally leading energy and engineering R&D hubs, large-scale CCS research was discontinued in 2014, following a complicated legislative process, very much driven by worries about possible dangers related to the technology.

On a panel on 19 June 2019, we discussed the opportunities and risks of CCS as a climate mitigation technology. The focus was on the “ethics of responsibility”. Would it be responsible to bet on a technology that may imply a residual risks (e.g. of leakages) in the near or more remote future? Is it, on the other hand, responsible to discontinue the development of a technology that many climate researcher consider important to contain global warming?

Panel:

  • Robin Batterham, University of Melbourne
  • Eve Tamme, Senior Advisor - International Climate Change Policy, Global CCS Institute
  • Evelyn Nyandoro, Manager for the South African Centre for Carbon Capture and Storage (SACCCS), South Africa (via Skype)

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Event information

Date / h
19.06.2019 / 16:00 - 18:00

Location

German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE)
Lecture hall
Tulpenfeld 6
53113 Bonn

Contact

Andreas Stamm
E-Mail Andreas.Stamm@idos-research.de
Phone +49 (0)228 94927-174
Fax +49 (0)228 94927-130

Bonn Alliance for Sustainability Research