Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
'Annex B' countries) by 5.2% of the 1990 levels by a commitment period between 2008 and
2012. It is expected that this reduction will be achieved in each Annex 1 country through
the 'domestic measures' of introduction of more effi cient, and/or less carbon intensive,
systems of power generation and industrial processing, with possibilities for the develop-
ment and management of forests and agricultural soils ('carbon sinks') to absorb carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere. These 'domestic measures' can be supported by the use of
international ' fl exible measures' such as emissions trading, joint implementation (JI) and the
clean development mechanism (CDM). Countries signed up to Kyoto have introduced a range
of policy measures aimed to ensure they meet their emissions targets. Some of these have
the effect of internalizing at least some of the external costs associated with global
warming.
7.4.4 Costing Pollution
The studies mentioned above along with several others have looked at overall damage poten-
tials on health and the environment, assigning a cost penalty to each generating technology,
depending on the fuel. This approach enables the difference in external costs between, for
example, coal and wind, to be easily compared. Another approach calculates costs per pol-
lutant, recognizing that different fuels generate different amounts of pollutant. Typically these
penalties, as proposed by some states in the USA, and as shown in Figure 7.8, are around
$ 10/tonne (
9000/tonne) for SO
2
. Since the
quantities of each pollutant, per kW h, are well known for the differing fuels, these costs
enable calculation of the external cost of each unit of electricity. Coal fi red generation is
highly polluting and produces about 1 kg of CO
2
per kW h, plus SO
2
and other pollutants. It
therefore attracts the highest penalties, as shown in Figure 7.9. Despite the wide variety of
approaches, the external cost assigned to coal fi red generation generally adds about 1 USc/
kW h. Gas, on the other hand, attracts a lower penalty. Table 7.5 summarizes data from the
studies already cited, and others, such as References [6] and [7] .
7/tonne) for CO
2
, and up to $ 25 000/tonne (
€
€
CO2
SO2
NOx
California
Minnesota
Nevada
New York
Denmark (Max.)
EU Carbon tax
EU ETS (Min)
(max)
0 10 20 30
$/tonne of CO2 , $000/tonne for SO2/NOx
Figure 7.8
Taxes on emissions levied or proposed. (Courtesy of David Milborrow)
