{"id":1248,"date":"2020-07-10T13:18:15","date_gmt":"2020-07-10T18:18:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/markets\/?p=1248"},"modified":"2020-07-10T13:51:26","modified_gmt":"2020-07-10T18:51:26","slug":"why-decarbonizing-heavy-industry-is-difficult-but-also-possible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/markets\/2020\/07\/10\/why-decarbonizing-heavy-industry-is-difficult-but-also-possible\/","title":{"rendered":"Decarbonizing industry is difficult but possible"},"content":{"rendered":"

Industry is the backbone of the U.S. economy: it provides and transforms raw materials, goods and chemicals needed for civilization, including the energy transition. Yet, it is also responsible for a third of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and 30% of U.S. GHG emissions .<\/p>\n

Industrial GHGs include direct (combustion of fossil fuels, leaks and byproducts) and indirect emissions (the purchase of electricity and heat). Even if we reduce indirect emissions through electrification and clean energy, uncontrolled direct emissions from industry would still be responsible for at least 20% of GHG emissions both globally and in the US. Heavy industry, which creates products like cement, iron and steel, chemicals and plastics is particularly carbon intensive, which is why we should invest in ways to mitigate its large direct emissions of CO2.<\/p>\n

Why decarbonizing heavy industry is a challenge<\/strong><\/p>\n

Decarbonizing heavy industry is difficult, because its direct emissions are the byproducts of chemical reactions or related to processes that require very high heat or fossil fuels as feedstocks. And because industry uses fossil fuels like coal as feedstock, manufacturing processes often rely on them for heat as well, making it more challenging to reduce industrial fossil fuel consumption. Moreover, there are other obstacles to rapid decarbonization, such as the long lifetimes of industrial facilities (possibly 30+ years) and their high capital intensity. This makes it difficult\u2014but also necessary\u2014to retire or retrofit them on a timeline consistent with limiting warming to 2 degrees Celsius or less.<\/p>\n

Another constraint: industrial products must often meet precise quality criteria to comply with safety regulations. In other words, lowering the carbon content of steel or cement manufacturing could impact the quality of the material outputs. Hence, if the characteristics\u00a0 of carbon-intensive industrial products change, the specifications associated with\u00a0 building codes and standards may need to change as well, especially if changes imply a modification of the physical properties of common building materials. Finally, geographical limitations like the local availability of renewable energy, key energy feedstocks and infrastructure as well as carbon storage capability may dictate the possibility of decarbonizing heavy industry or not.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why we need to move forward with developing technology and processes that can decarbonize direct emissions from heavy industry. Luckily, several options are available.<\/p>\n

Reducing CO2 emissions from high temperature industrial processes\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

For industrial heat, there are temperature, quality and flow rate constraints on viable options that stand in contrast to electricity and residential heat (the temperatures required in heavy industry varies from 200\u00b0C to 2,000\u00b0C). The Columbia Center on Global Energy Policy<\/a> identified hydrogen (blue, from natural gas or green, from renewable feedstocks), biomass and biofuels, electricity (resistance and microwave), nuclear (conventional and advanced), concentrated solar energy, and carbon capture utilization and storage (CCUS) as options for tackling decarbonization of industrial heat. Each has technical and economical tradeoffs:<\/p>\n