Japanese wind energy development policy: Grand plan or group think?

This paper analyzes Japan's national power generation strategy with a view to explaining Japan's phlegmatic approach to wind energy development. The analysis concludes that Japan's current power generation strategy is not optimized to achieve the government's three strategic energy objectives of simultaneously enhancing economic security, national energy security and environmental security (3Es). To achieve long-run energy sustainability, Japan needs to strive to phase out nuclear power, which is the centerpiece of its current power generation strategy. The analysis concludes by offering four suggestions for a sustainable 3E power generation strategy: (1) internalize all external costs associated with power generation technologies in order to level the economic playing field, (2) increase feed-in mandates for renewable energy to 20%, (3) fully liberalize the power generation industry and (4) intensify R&D in energy storage technologies to support intermittent renewable technologies.     

Timing-based business models for flexibility creation in the electric power sector

Energy policies in many countries push for an increase in the generation of wind and solar power. Along these developments, the balance between supply and demand becomes more challenging as the generation of wind and solar power is volatile, and flexibility of supply and demand becomes valuable. As a consequence, companies in the electric power sector develop new business models that create flexibility through activities of timing supply and demand. Based on an extensive qualitative analysis of interviews and industry research in the energy industry, the paper at hand explores the role of timing-based business models in the power sector and sheds light on the mechanisms of flexibility creation through timing. In particular we distill four ideal-type business models of flexibility creation with timing and reveal how they can be classified along two dimensions, namely costs of multiplicity and intervention costs. We put forward that these business models offer ‘coupled services’, combining resource-centered and service-centered perspectives. This complementary character has important implications for energy policy.     

Energy conservation and circular economy in China's process industries

Since energy consumption in process industries accounts for a great proportion of China's total energy consumption, energy conservation becomes the practical choice to reduce the conflict between energy demand and energy supply in China, and therefore, promoting energy conservation is the long-term solution to China's energy and environment problems from the source. In this paper, based on the introduction of the concept of energy consumption status in China's key energy-consuming process industries, the main technical bottlenecks and resource-environment problems were analyzed with special emphasis on energy utilization efficiency, energy consumption mode, and waste emission. As for the measures to resolve these problems, at the policy level, policies and programs of Chinese government related to energy conservation were introduced in combination with China's circular economy structure. At the technical level, the key technologies and research progress to improve energy utilization efficiency, reducing energy consumption, as well as utilizing the resource of discharged wastes were reviewed. Finally, three typical cases of the development of circular economy at three levels, namely the chemical industry, metallurgical industry, and electric power industry, were studied for the enforcement of circular economy and energy conservation in China's process industries.     

世界光伏发电产业的发展与展望

根据欧洲光伏工业协会（EPIA）对全球以及世界主要光伏产业国家的情景预测结果,结合其他相关资料,探讨了世界光伏发电产业的现状,分析了世界光伏产业的发展趋势。目前光伏发电的成本较高,发展速度受政府的扶持政策影响很大,光伏发电作为一种清洁的可再生能源将逐步成为世界能源供应的主体,在许多国家政府的支持下世界光伏产业发展经历了飞速发展的十年,累计装机容量和新增市场达到历史新高。但是,各国的发展很不平衡,特别是受全球经济衰退的影响,一些国家的光伏发电发展速度受政策调整影响有所放慢,不过从长期来看世界光伏产业的发展非常乐观,特别是我国政府为了克服经济发展的能源瓶颈和发展内需的决策,有望在不久的将来成为世界三大光伏发电市场之一。     

The prospective of coal power in China: Will it reach a plateau in the coming decade?

Coal power holds the king position in China's generation mix and has resulted in ever-increasing ecological and environmental issues; hence, the development of the electric power sector is confronted with a series of new challenges. China has recently adopted a new economic principle of the “new economic normal,” which has a large effect on the projection electricity demand and power generation planning through 2020. This paper measures electricity demand based upon China's social and economic structure. The 2020 roadmap presents China's developing targets for allocating energy resources to meet new demands, and the 2030 roadmap is compiled based upon an ambitious expansion of clean energy sources. Results show that electricity demand is expected to reach 7500 TWh in 2020 and 9730 TWh in 2030. Coal power is expected to reach its peak in 2020 at around 970 GW, and will then enter a plateau, even with a pathway of active electricity substitution in place.     

Towards a hydrogen economy in Poland

The global changes in energy policy, including the increasing contribution of renewable sources of energy to the total output of produced energy and various attempts to introduce advanced energy technologies, and the increasingly efficient use of the energy that had already been emitted are sufficient reasons to discuss Poland's energy policy. The present work features an analysis of the current state of Poland's energy economy and the economic factors that affect the power industry. The tenets of Poland's current energy policy are also presented in the context of hydrogen energy. The possibilities and limitations concerning the transition to hydrogen power in Poland are discussed taking into account a number of aspects, some of which include the degree of development of the electric power infrastructure, the current and future demand for electric energy with regard to the current geopolitical and economic situation of Poland, and Poland's membership in the European Union.     

日本地震对世界和我国液化天然气产业的影响

2011年3月,日本东北部太平洋海域发生大地震和海啸,导致日本大批发电机组受损,引发福岛核泄漏事故,对世界和我国液化天然气(LNG)产业的发展产生了深远的影响。短期来看,多家日本电力公司大量采购LNG弥补电力缺口,短期和现货LNG市场趋紧,价格上涨;长期来看,福岛核泄漏事故对世界各国的核电规划与发展造成影响,世界LNG潜在需求增加,长期LNG资源的价格博弈愈加激烈。LNG作为我国天然气供应的重要组成部分,对调整我国能源消费结构、实现我国碳减排目标、保障我国沿海地区天然气安全稳定供应意义重大。当前世界LNG市场形势复杂多变,建议继续密切跟踪国内外形势变化,及时调整资源合作与开发策略,实现我国液化天然气产业的可持续发展。     

Techno-economic analysis of a potential energy trading link between Patagonia and Japan based on CO2 free hydrogen

With regard to the Fukushima Daiichi accident in 2011 and Japan's goal to reduce CO₂ emission, the Japanese government strives for an emission free “hydrogen society” in which hydrogen will be the primary energy medium. The import of hydrogen generated by means of CO₂ free wind electricity from overseas can be a promising option for Japan's prospective energy supply. Besides different other factors like specific costs of electrolyzers and hydrogen shipment over long distances, the economically reasonable export of hydrogen based on renewable energy requires low levelized costs of electricity. Within the scope of this study, the underlying idea of a hydrogen supply chain is taken up and revisited by means of a spatially highly resolved wind energy potential analysis and a detailed investigation of the supply chain elements between Patagonia and Japan.Our analysis reveals that approximately 25% of the total land area in Patagonia would be eligible. Approx. 33,000 turbines with a minimum number of 4500 full-load hours with an overall capacity of about 115 GW can be positioned. Taking into consideration the related average number of 4750 full-load hours and an electrolysis efficiency of 0.7, this leads to a potential production of about 11.5 million tons/year of hydrogen. So the wind power potential of Patagonia would theoretically be sufficient for the assumed Japanese hydrogen demand of 8.83 million tons/year. The total hydrogen pretax cost would amount to approx. 4.40 €/kg_H2 at a liquid state at the harbor of Yokohama. Hence, the final specific costs of hydrogen in Japan depend on the expansion of wind power in Patagonia and therefore hydrogen based on wind energy can be cost-competitive to conventional fuels.     

Empowered? Evaluating Japan's national energy strategy under the DPJ administration

In August 2009, after 54 years of virtually unbroken rule, Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was ousted from power by the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ). The DPJ's campaign platform included a pledge to facilitate extreme reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Yet, at the COP16 meeting in Cancun, Japan announced that it would not accept further emission reduction targets without broader commitment from all nations. This paper seeks to explain this dichotomy by employing a targeted stakeholder evaluation based on surveys with 321 Japanese citizens to assess the extent to which influential stakeholder groups in Japan supports a potentially costly transition to a low-carbon energy infrastructure amidst severe economic challenges that the nation faces. Findings help explain Japan's adversarial role in COP16 negotiations in Cancun, despite the stated GHG reduction ambitions of Japan's current ruling party. The analysis concludes that if the DPJ does embrace aggressive CO₂ reduction targets in the future, the strategic focus will likely mirror the former ruling party's energy policy of bolstering nuclear power generation capacity and promoting energy efficiency improvements while exhibiting lukewarm commitment to supporting capacity development in alternative sources of energy supply such as solar panels and wind turbines.     

Growing Chinese coal use: Dramatic resource and environmental implications

Chinese coal consumption continues to rise as the country's economy and industry expand. Coal is particularly critical for China's fast-growing power sector, generating about 80% of electricity output. Notwithstanding the importance of coal and electricity, many international forecasts today underestimate their rising use in China. This paper acknowledges the current world financial crisis and assumes that Chinese GDP growth to 2025 will not again approach double-digit levels. Using the scenario analysis, this paper demonstrates that even with conservative assumptions about Chinese GDP growth and income elasticity of electric demand to 2025, the country will likely experience much higher coal demand and emit much greater volumes of carbon dioxide than forecast by various international energy agencies. The paper also analyzes how China's domestic coal reserves may be threatened within two decades, possibly affecting long-term economic growth in China, as well as world coal prices.     

The role of hydropower in meeting Turkey's electric energy demand

The inherent technical, economic and environmental benefits of hydroelectric power, make it an important contributor to the future world energy mix, particularly in the developing countries. These countries, such as Turkey, have a great and ever-intensifying need for power and water supplies and they also have the greatest remaining hydro potential. From the viewpoint of energy sources such as petroleum and natural gas, Turkey is not a rich country; but it has an abundant hydropower potential to be used for generation of electricity and must increase hydropower production in the near future. This paper deals with policies to meet the increasing electricity demand for Turkey. Hydropower and especially small hydropower are emphasized as Turkey's renewable energy sources. The results of two case studies, whose results were not taken into consideration in calculating Turkey's hydro electric potential, are presented. Turkey's small hydro power potential is found to be an important energy source, especially in the Eastern Black Sea Region. The results of a study in which Turkey's long-term demand has been predicted are also presented. According to the results of this paper, Turkey's hydro electric potential can meet 33–46% of its electric energy demand in 2020 and this potential may easily and economically be developed.     

煤矿地质灾害防治措施研究

随着中国人口的急剧增加和生活水平的提高,人们对于能源的需求在不断增加,煤炭业迅速发展,使得煤矿被过度开采,破坏了地质结构,导致煤矿地质灾害频发。通过对煤矿地质灾害的特点、类型、发生因素进行分析,探讨如何防治地质灾害的发生。     

Electric power requirement for large-scale production of hydrogen fuel for the world vehicle fleet

Replacement of fossil fuels by hydrogen in motor vehicles throughout the world is postulated to occur over the next 50 years as mass production of fuel-cell engines accelerates. For the estimated size of the world vehicle fleet by 2050, large-scale electrolysis of water may become the primary means to produce hydrogen in sufficient quantity. Unlike petroleum production, which is concentrated in only a few well-endowed countries in the world, electrolytic production of hydrogen can be carried out in all countries as an indigenous supply of fuel. However, each nation will require a significant increase in the rate of electric energy consumption and a concomitant increase in electric power generating facilities. A dynamic model was used to estimate the annual total electric energy requirement to sustain long-term growth of hydrogen fuel production in two time sequences. In the first sequence, from 2000 to 2010, when a fuel-cell engine industry is likely to expand rapidly, extrapolation of historic data on world population, vehicle, traffic, and energy statistics from official agencies provides the initial conditions in year 2010 for the second time sequence. In the second sequence, the model examines a range of growth scenarios to the year 2050, when a significant fraction of the total world vehicle fleet could be operated with hydrogen fuel. The model calculations show that even with improved energy consumption efficiency of electrolytic production facilities, the additional electric energy demand to sustain growth of hydrogen fuel production will require installation of significant additional electric power generating capacity throughout the world.     

Continuous operation in an electric and hydrogen hybrid energy storage system for renewable power generation and autonomous emergency power supply

Under the background of extensive improvement of renewable resources and demand for reliable emergency power supply, we proposed a hybrid energy storage system including an electric double-layer capacitor bank and a hydrogen system which is composed of fuel cell, electrolyzer, gas tank and metal hydride tank. Through its integration with photovoltaic power sources in a local direct current grid, we expect to obtain both of stable energy source at ordinary times and long-time reliable autonomous emergency power supply when outages happen. A three-day demonstration of the proposed system was performed. The fluctuation compensation performance of the components and the long-time stable power supply obtained by the entire system were evaluated at first, hence the configuration and the management methods of the proposed system were verified in the autonomous emergency power supply application. Meanwhile, the performance of the hybrid use of the gas tank and the metal hydride tank in the system was preliminarily evaluated, for its effectiveness verification on reducing auxiliary power for temperature condition of the metal hydride tank. Moreover, we investigated the distribution characteristics of the power and energy loss in the electric double-layer capacitor, electrolyzer and fuel cell, and their correlation to the efficiency characteristics under different conditions during the operation. The investigation results showed that the continual low-load-ratio state of the electrolyzer and fuel cell led to the low efficiency, the rare high-power occurrence of the electrolyzer and fuel cell led their demanded excessive power capacity. Thus, we proposed a solution method of shifting the electrolyzer and fuel cell's load to the EDLC, when the electrolyzer and fuel cell are in low-load-ratio and excessive high-power state, in order for efficiency increase and facility capacity reduction.     

A review on the pattern of electricity generation and emission in Indonesia from 1987 to 2009

The level of energy demand plays a fundamental role in today's society. It is a vital input in supporting the physical and social development of a country, as well as national economic growth. Looking at the energy demand scenario in present time, the global energy consumption is likely to grow faster than the population growth across the world. Like any other energy sectors, electricity demand has significantly increased in Indonesia over the past years. Currently, there are six types of power plants in the country. The main sources of electrical energy are generated using the gas turbines, steam turbines, combined cycles, geothermal, diesel engine and hydro-powers. Most of Indonesia's power plants are using fossil fuel for electricity generation. Substantial growth in domestic energy demand, however, would be a major challenge for Indonesia's energy supply sector in the future. Over the past decade, thermal power plants generated about 86.69% of electricity and about 13.31% was generated by renewable energy such as hydro-power and geothermal in 2009. The purpose of this study is to chronicle and show a clear view of 23 years trend of Indonesia's electricity generation industry. Furthermore, the capacity of power generation installed and electricity generation from 1987 to 2009 has been gathered for this study. The total pollutant emissions and emission per unit electricity generation for each type of power plants have been also calculated using emission factors. Also, the pattern of electricity generation and emission has been presented. The results show that the implementation and contribution of combined cycle power plants should be increased together with renewable energy and natural gas which are recommended to reduce greenhouse gas emission.     

ENERGY SYSTEM AND ITS FUTURE IN CHINA

Energy system is a sub-system of the large scale system, which covers the social activities of mankind, and is an important material foundation of the modern construction. This paper expounds the China's energy system and its future in the following five aspects:

1. The great achievements in energy exploration, conservation and energy balance and technology during the past 40 years:

2. The characteristics of the China's energy system, including energy resources, its geographic distribution, energy production and consumption mix, the shortage of energy supply and energy conservation, the self-sufficient of energy supply

3. The basic instruction and guideline for China's energy industry development, the basic task and the targets of energy development towards year 2000

4. The future strategic measures including:

(1) Energy conservation, which is an important measure for alleviating the shortage of energy supply and environment pollution

(2) Electric power industry (thermal power, hydropower, nuclear power, electric power grids and exploiting new energy, etc.)

(3) Coal industry construction (the coal bases, the local coal mines and the policies of technology)

(4) Make great efforts to speed up the exploitation of oil and natural gas

(5) Actively prevent the pollution of environment by five measures

5. In light of reform and opening to the outside, the energy system should deepen its institutional structure reform, strengthen the self-development capacity, extend the opening further, enhance international cooperation, make fully use of the international market, and develop the China's energy industry more rapidly

Energy system is a subsystem of the large system of human activities, and energy exploitation is closely related to the development of human society. China has a 5000 year civilization history and is the first country in the world to exploit hydropower energy and to discover and utilize coal, petroleum and natural gas. Energy is an important foundation in modernization development. Chinese government has been paying particular attention to the development of energy industry and regards it as main prospect of national development strategy. Energy system plays a role of basic industry in the large system of Chinese economic development.     

Off-grid solar powered charging station for electric and hydrogen vehicles including fuel cell and hydrogen storage

This paper designs an off-grid charging station for electric and hydrogen vehicles. Both the electric and hydrogen vehicles are charged at the same time. They appear as two electrical and hydrogen load demand on the charging station and the charging station is powered by solar panels. The output power of solar system is separated into two parts. On part of solar power is used to supply the electrical load demand (to charge the electric vehicles) and rest runs water electrolyzer and it will be converted to the hydrogen. The hydrogen is stored and it supplies the hydrogen load demand (to charge the hydrogen-burning vehicles). The uncertainty of parameters (solar energy, consumed power by electrical vehicles, and consumed power by hydrogen vehicles) is included and modeled. The fuel cell is added to the charging station to deal with such uncertainty. The fuel cell runs on hydrogen and produces electrical energy to supply electrical loading under uncertainties. The diesel generator is also added to the charging station as a supplementary generation. The problem is modeled as stochastic optimization programming and minimizes the investment and operational costs of solar and diesel systems. The introduced planning finds optimal rated powers of solar system and diesel generator, operation pattern for diesel generator and fuel cell, and the stored hydrogen. The results confirm that the cost of changing station is covered by investment cost of solar system (95%), operational cost of diesel generator (4.5%), and investment cost of diesel generator (0.5%). The fuel cell and diesel generator supply the load demand when the solar energy is zero. About 97% of solar energy will be converted to hydrogen and stored. The optimal operation of diesel generator reduces the cost approximately 15%.     

调整电力工业结构 大力发展清洁电力

从发电装机、电力结构、电网发展、电力政策体制等多方面阐述了中国电力工业发展的现状,分析了当前中国电力工业发展遇到的瓶颈,认为坚定不移地发展清洁电力,提高能源效率,减少污染物排放,保护生态环境是世界电力工业发展的大趋势,也是中国电力工业健康发展的内在要求,最后提出了几点建议。     

Market-driven energy pricing necessary to ensure China's power supply

China's rapid economic growth has strained its power supply, as manifested for instance by the widespread 2008 power shortage. The cause for this shortage is thought to be the current Chinese energy pricing system, which is mainly government rather than market controlled. Government-regulated price-caps for coal have seriously affected coal supply. At the same time price-caps for electricity supply have caused suspension of power plant operation. As a result, the average operating time of coal-fired power plants declined 50 h annually across the nation in the first half of 2008 compared to the previous year, despite clear power shortages. Here, it will be suggested that energy pricing, set by supply and demand may effectively discourage excessive growth in heavy industry, substantially encourage energy conservation and efficiency, and curb the rapid electricity demand in China. It will be argued that a market-oriented electricity pricing mechanism is required for China to secure its future power supply.     

国内石油公司在天然气发电领域应有所作为

从我国电力消费逐年大幅增加,远大于能源消费增幅,我国电力企业长期以来具有收益稳定、持续盈利能力强的特点等几方面分析了国内石油公司参与天然气发电业务的必要性。指出,在我国电力需求增长潜力巨大、燃气发电有很大潜力、以及大规模开发和利用天然气资源的大好形势下,国内石油公司作为天然气供应者和电力消费大户,应借鉴国际石油公司的经验,积极主动地培育天然气发电市场,通过优化资源配置、与电力公司结成天然气利用同盟军、争取得到更多的政策支持等措施,推进天然气发电项目的落实,促进我国天然气发电事业的发展。