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The author explains global bioenergy supply potential and economic bioenergy uses in the future calculated by a multiregional global land use and energy model (GLUE). Concerning the bioenergy supply potential, the following results were obtained. (1) Supply potential of energy crops produced from surplus arable land will be available in North America, Western Europe, Oceania, Latin America, and the former USSR and Eastern Europe. However, the potential of energy crops will be strongly affected by variation of parameters of food supply and demand such as animal food demand. (2) Bioenergy supply potential of biomass residues will be stable against a change of a food demand parameter. The ultimate bioenergy supply potential of biomass residues will be 265 EJ/year in the world in 2100. (3) CO2 emission constraints will be advantageous to bioenergy, the CO2 intensity of which is close to zero. In 2050 the bioenergy used economically in the world is 74 EJ/year in no CO2 constraint case (FREE case), 131 EJ/year in COP3 forever case (CP3F case) and 337 EJ/year in a case where the CO2 emissions will be 30% less than that in CP3F (C30R case). (4) Biomass gasifier and biomass-gasifier-combined-cycle (BGCC) will be used on a large scale in any cases in 2050. Synthesis gas (H2 and CO) produced by biomass gasifier will be used mainly to make synthesized liquid fuel such as methanol and syn-oil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this panel is to identify implications of the papers and discussions of the past two days on the oil and gas industry. We heard that oil is being produced by unstable countries that cannot assure security of supply for a strategic commodity, and that it causes environmental degradation. However, the public needs a more balanced picture when the question of future energy supplies is being discussed. The world oil industry is meeting a huge task today. It produces around 82 million barrels a day (mn b/d), with a large part of it serving the transportation sector. There are today more than 500mn vehicles on the road worldwide. Replacing oil, or substituting other sources of energy in its place, will need more than what today's technologies can provide, and at much lower cost. Gas-to-Liquids (GTL), for example, is not forecast to grow more than 500,000 b/d by the end of decade. Moreover, demand for oil is not static. It is, in fact, rising by 1.5-2.0% annually. Global demand is forecast to reach 120mn b/d at the end of the next decade. In order to produce the 82mn b/d and to find new oil to substitute for what is being consumed and to meet future demand, the world oil industry invests around $100bn annually on exploration alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The voluntary agreement between the European Commission and the automotive industry to cut new car CO2 emissions by 25% between 1995 and 2009 is probably the most important EU initiative to curb carbon emissions as it addresses the road transport sector, whose growth may cancel out all other attempts to meet the EU's Kyoto commitment. The paper evaluates progress in automobile fuel economy and CO2 emissions observed since 1995, examines the issue within the international context and attempts to assess whether further improvements are possible after 2010 in Europe. Based on data available up to mid-2005 it seems that, in the absence of strong technical progress and remarkable changes in consumer behavior until 2009, the industry's commitment can only be met with some years' delay. Moreover, it is most likely that technical progress will not persist in the future unless a policy mix of regulations and economic instruments is implemented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to give a brief overall account of the present situation and outlook in terms of transport energy use and GHG emissions in the context of European Union transport policy. This topic is a huge one, and no attempt at comprehension is claimed. Instead the assessment will be based on a selection of a few key indicators, which the author believes are important to evaluate the present situation and identify challenges for future action and research. The indicators are all drawn from official sources or scholarly studies, while the ways in which they are interpreted and presented here are those of the author alone. During 2006 the European transport policy White Paper will undergo an official mid-term review by the European Commission. This will provide an opportunity for further reflections and possibly new directions for some of the issues to be discussed here. The present paper will first (in Section 10.2) present what we call system indicators, with the aim to highlight some critical aspects of the European transport systems' standing in terms of volume, growth, energy use and GHG emissions. Then the paper moves into policy. Section 10.3 highlights a few fundamental conditions for transport policy-making in the European Union, while Section 10.4 will go through some of the relevant targets and measures that have been adopted, evaluating them one by one with simple policy indicators. After summing up performance, Section 10.5 will address the outlooks for European transport beyond the present Kyoto agreement period, and some research issues related to policy implementation in that context will be identified. Finally a few conclusive statements are proposed, not about how much European transport, exactly, there will be room for in the common greenhouse of the future, but rather on the kinds of discussions that need to be faced in dealing with this sector's climate impact in the coming years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The steady rise in atmospheric CO2 levels (Figure 1) has been identified as the major cause of global average temperature rise, which has occurred since the start of the industrial revolution early in the nineteenth century and has accelerated in the last 50 years. The world population growth in the last 50 years has been from about 2.6 to 6.2 billion, mostly in the less developed countries (Figure 2). All these people naturally aspire to a more prosperous lifestyle and this inevitably leads to more pollution and more rapid consumption of fossil fuels and emission of greenhouse gases, principally CO2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a first priority we have to reduce primary energy use dramatically for reasons well known (finite resources, climate change, political instability). For decades to come, fossil fuels will be the primary source of energy, with gas and coal playing a much more important role. Sequestration will be a must. And nuclear energy quite likely will see a comeback; the problems regarding waste disposal can be solved today — terrorism is much more of a concern. Home heating should be done with heat pumps; liquid fuels reserved for transport. And let's introduce alternatives at a faster pace — we need to gain much more experience; a lot of proposals need verification. It is too early to tell which are the winners and losers. A responsible energy policy is doable and payable. Universities have to develop more leadership — we have to win over the young generation. Universities have to act as honest brokers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nuclear energy is an important source of electricity in many countries. It produces approximately 7% of the world's primary energy consumption. There are in total 440 reactors in operation around the world [1]. The first generation of nuclear reactors was designed in the 1950s and '60s. The second generation began in the 1970s in the large commercial power plants that are now in operation. The future of nuclear power involves difficult issues: economics, waste disposal, safety, proliferation and an energy policy that is specific to each country. A general review can be found in the MIT interdisciplinary study [2]. The conclusions of the IAEA Ministerial Conference, held in Paris in March 2005, indicate a strong evolution of the worldwide perception on nuclear energy. Ministerial delegations from 30 countries, and representatives from 74 countries and from 10 international organizations discussed the perspectives of "Nuclear Power for the 21st Century." There was no unanimous view, but a significant majority proposed that the contribution of nuclear energy should be increased to meet future world energy needs. Many delegations have expressed the urgent need to make decisions and take measures to make easier the implementation of new nuclear production systems, in particular for developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The world's energy supply is largely based on conventional energy sources. Most of these sources of energy, however, will not last forever and have proven to be one of the main causes of our environmental problems. Environmental impacts of energy use are not new but they are increasingly well known. They range from deforestation to local and global pollution. It is clear therefore, that in due time renewable energies1 will dominate the world's energy supply system, due to their inherent advantages such as mitigation of climate change, generation of employment and reduction of poverty, as well as increased energy security and supply. Renewable energy technologies are well suited to respond to the limitations of current energy patterns and contribute to the further modernisation of the energy sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Underground storage of industrial quantities of carbon dioxide in porous and permeable reservoir rocks has been taking place for the last 11 years at the Sleipner West gas field in the North Sea. A further commercial-scale CO2 storage project has recently begun at In Salah, Algeria, and the Snohvit field, Barents Sea, is to begin injecting CO2 underground in late 2007 or early 2008. A monitored CO2-EOR project is underway at Weyburn, Canada and research scale injection projects have been undertaken at Nagaoka (Japan), Frio (USA) and K12-B (offshore Netherlands). This demonstrates that CO2 can be successfully injected into underground storage reservoirs on a large scale. Natural analogues (natural fields of CO2 and other buoyant fluids) demonstrate that under favourable conditions gases can be retained in the subsurface for millions of years. Although there is still very significant uncertainty in the actual figures, it appears that globally there is enough underground storage capacity for CO2 storage technology to make a significant impact on global emissions to the atmosphere. Some other major issues that must be addressed if this technology is to spread to power stations, and thus make a significant impact on global CO2 emissions, are the cost of CO2 capture, further demonstrations of safe and secure storage and public acceptance that long-term storage will be successful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This chapter discusses prospects for increased consumption of natural gas within the European Union (EU). Particular emphasis is on the power generation sector where the main growth in demand is expected to occur, on supply and infrastructural constraints and on the future price of natural gas. It can be concluded that EU gas-import needs will increase substantially up to 2010, driven by a combination of rapid increase in demand in southern Europe and declining production in northern Europe. As a result there will be an increased import dependency which will affect security of supply, not only in the gas sector but also in the electricity sector. However, supplies of gas are plentiful, at least in the medium term, and a number of new countries will emerge as substantial suppliers to the European gas market, increasing competition and possibly leading to a situation of oversupply between 2008 and 2012, which in turn may create a downward pressure on spot market gas prices. In addition, the US market may experience considerable oversupply between around 2008 and 2015, reducing the possibilities of conducting arbitrage between the two main markets in the Atlantic basin. On the other hand, the oil price will continue to be a major determinant of the gas price and a tight oil supply/demand balance will create an upward pressure on the gas price. Large investments will be required in order to extract and transport the gas to the markets and, in particular, it can be questioned to what extent Russia will manage to raise production capacity in the short term. Also, the producing countries are prone to invest according to national interest rather than to supply an increasing global demand. Problems related to gas production capacity together with abundant supply to the EU markets and increased competition points to Russia losing market share in the short run. In the long run, it can be expected that the EU's dependency on gas from Russia and the Middle East will increase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While this presentation in its title aims to review the environmental and water resource impacts in the eastern Mediterranean, in the subtitle emphasis is given to the fact that regional issues are inseparably linked with the environment/climate of a greater area. The mid-latitude water bodies extending from Gibraltar eastwards to the Aral Sea can be identified as a true "medi-terra"nean complex of seas locked between continents increasingly isolated from the world ocean, which together form an interconnected climatic unit. The climates of the "downstream" water bodies, i.e., the Eastern Mediterranean, and Black and Caspian seas, are linked with the climates of the adjoining continents of Europe, Africa and Asia, which in turn are affected by the climates of the adjoining Atlantic and Indian oceans. Ocean-atmosphere-land interactions and consequent feedbacks between regional and global climate systems could be disproportionately large in this region of contrasts between marine and continental climates, and complex land/sea bottom topography (Özsoy 1999). High gradients in physical characteristics, as well as in so- cioeconomics, make the region prone to impacts of climate change, implying possible changes in hydrology and ecosystems. On the basis of our present understanding, it is not clear how the global climate system is projected onto the region, or how the region contributes to the global system. Unexpectedly large impacts could occur, as they have done in the past, in such a complex system, in response to global change. On the other hand the typically delayed human response to environmental emergencies can result in irreparable damage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between human activities and climate change, involving both causes as well as impacts, has become a major issue of concern and interest all over the world. The Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change informs us that the atmospheric concentration of CO2 has increased from 280 ppm in the period 1000-1750 AD to 379 ppm in the year 2005. The terrestrial biospheric exchange had been a cumulative source of about 30 Gt C for the past two centuries but acted as a sink in the 1990s. The concentration of methane in the atmosphere has more than doubled from 700 ppb in the period 1000-1750 AD, to reach a concentration of 1774 ppb in the year 2005. The concentrations of hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons, SF6 and N2O have also increased. The tropospheric concentration of ozone has increased even though its stratospheric concentration has decreased. The rising emissions and concentrations of all these gases have led to numerous changes in global climate variables. The global mean surface temperature is very likely to have increased by 0.74±0.18°C during the hundred year period 1906-2005. Although the increase is spread out all over the globe, it is greater in the northern hemisphere, and land areas have warmed faster than the oceans. It is very likely that the number of hot days and hot nights has increased and the number of cold days, cold nights and frost has decreased for nearly all land areas. The continental precipitation has increased in the eastern parts of North and South America, northern Europe and central Asia. However, it has decreased in some regions of Africa, southern Asia and the Mediterranean. It is also likely that the area affected by drought has increased since 1970. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]