EIONET E NERGY M EETING Renewable energy in Europe – Technical Report Mihai Tomescu Project Manager – Energy ACC3, EEA 05 March 2016

C ONTEXT EU 2020 climate and energy package (GHG, RES and EE targets) EU 2030 framework for climate and energy EEA annual Trends and Projections Report

C ONTEXT EU 2020 climate and energy package (GHG, RES and EE targets) EU 2030 framework for climate and energy EEA annual Trends and Projections Report Detailed RES report …

W HAT THE REPORT DOES Presents more detailed RES information than what is feasible in the Trends and Projections Report Approximates early (historical) RES shares (data that are not available from official publications) Aims to answer two hypothetical questions: o What other energy sources would be used today, if RES consumption stayed at the same level as in 2005? o What would have been the associated gross GHG emissions of these sources?

5 M AIN F INDINGS Wind, solar, biomass and other renewable energy technologies continued to grow in At EU level, the share of renewables increased to almost 15% by Without the deployment of renewable energy since 2005, greenhouse gas emissions in 2012 could have been 7% higher than actual emissions Renewable technologies also increase energy security. Without the additional use of renewable energy since 2005, the EU's consumption of fossil fuels could have been about 7% higher in The most substituted fuel was coal, where consumption would have been 13% higher, while natural gas use would have been 7% higher, at a time when European gas reserves are dwindling.

EU ACTUAL AND APPROXIMATED RES SHARES 6

P ROXY RES SHARES AND NATIONAL TARGETS 7

G ROSS AVOIDED GHG S COMPARED TO TOTAL GHG S (%, 2012) 8

Rel. & abs. reduction of gross inland fossil fuel use (2012) 9

Q UESTIONS FROM EIONET Is similar work available in the EIONET countries? If yes, what is the approach taken? How can we further enhance the usefulness of this report? Are there any other similar methods, which attempt to capture the impacts of RES on fossil fuel use and GHG emissions? (How) do the member countries use the information in this report? 10

11 Thank you!

M ETHODOLOGY - P ROXIES Direct use of relevant data sources: although not all variables are available on time some can be taken directly from Eurostat or other sources. Trend change: if a relevant driver for a certain variable is available on time the trend change of this driver can be used to estimate the change of the variable. Linear trend extrapolation: if a variable shows a clear linear trend this can be used to extrapolate the value for the year t ‑ 1. Previous year’s value: the value for the year t-2 or average of past years is used for t ‑ 1 12

M ETHODOLOGY – G ROSS AVOIDED GHG S (1/2) In essence, the method assumes that renewable energy (electricity, heating and transport fuels) replaces a set of initial energy carriers that would otherwise be supplied by non-renewable sources. Gross avoided emissions are calculated on an annual basis against a hypothetical scenario that aims to highlight the additional RES contributions since

M ETHODOLOGY – G ROSS AVOIDED GHG S (2/2) In detail, there are 2 main steps: 1.Determine the amount of RES consumed in each country and year, by energy carrier and by RES technology; 2.Calculate gross avoided fossil fuels and GHG emissions, by country and year: (a) Determine the primary energy use for electricity, heating and transport. Primary energy factors enable the equivalent substitution of one unit of energy from conventional sources, by one unit of renewable energy; (b) Based on results obtained under (a) and 1, determine the gross avoided fossil fuels, by country, year and fuel type. (c) By using CO2 emission factors per type of fossil fuel, the primary fossil fuel consumption is converted to an amount of GHG emissions. 14