Water-carbon trade-off in China's coal power industry.
View / Open Files
Publication Date
2014-10-07Journal Title
Environ Sci Technol
ISSN
0013-936X
Publisher
American Chemical Society (ACS)
Volume
48
Issue
19
Pages
11082-11089
Language
eng
Type
Article
Physical Medium
Print-Electronic
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Zhang, C., Anadon, L. D., Mo, H., Zhao, Z., & Liu, Z. (2014). Water-carbon trade-off in China's coal power industry.. Environ Sci Technol, 48 (19), 11082-11089. https://doi.org/10.1021/es5026454
Abstract
The energy sector is increasingly facing water scarcity constraints in many regions around the globe, especially in China, where the unprecedented large-scale construction of coal-fired thermal power plants is taking place in its extremely arid northwest regions. As a response to water scarcity, air-cooled coal power plants have experienced dramatic diffusion in China since the middle 2000s. By the end of 2012, air-cooled coal-fired thermal power plants in China amounted to 112 GW, making up 14% of China's thermal power generation capacity. But the water conservation benefit of air-cooled units is achieved at the cost of lower thermal efficiency and consequently higher carbon emission intensity. We estimate that in 2012 the deployment of air-cooled units contributed an additional 24.3-31.9 million tonnes of CO2 emissions (equivalent to 0.7-1.0% of the total CO2 emissions by China's electric power sector), while saving 832-942 million m(3) of consumptive water use (about 60% of the total annual water use of Beijing) when compared to a scenario with water-cooled plants. Additional CO2 emissions from air-cooled plants largely offset the CO2 emissions reduction benefits from Chinese policies of retiring small and outdated coal plants. This water-carbon trade-off is poised to become even more significant by 2020, as air-cooled units are expected to grow by a factor of 2-260 GW, accounting for 22% of China's total coal-fired power generation capacity.
Keywords
Air, Air Pollutants, Air Pollution, Carbon, Carbon Dioxide, China, Coal, Diffusion, Fresh Water, Geography, Industry, Models, Theoretical, Power Plants, Water, Water Supply
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/es5026454
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/280424
Rights
Licence:
http://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved
Statistics
Total file downloads (since January 2020). For more information on metrics see the
IRUS guide.
Recommended or similar items
The current recommendation prototype on the Apollo Repository will be turned off on 03 February 2023. Although the pilot has been fruitful for both parties, the service provider IKVA is focusing on horizon scanning products and so the recommender service can no longer be supported. We recognise the importance of recommender services in supporting research discovery and are evaluating offerings from other service providers. If you would like to offer feedback on this decision please contact us on: support@repository.cam.ac.uk