Exploring Energy Pathways for the Low-Carbon Transformation in India—A Model-Based Analysis

Abstract

With an increasing expected energy demand and current dominance of coal electrification, India plays a major role in global carbon policies and the future low-carbon transformation. This paper explores three energy pathways for India until 2050 by applying the linear, cost-minimizing, global energy system model (GENeSYS-MOD). The benchmark scenario “limited emissions only” (LEO) is based on ambitious targets set out by the Paris Agreement. A more conservative “business as usual” (BAU) scenario is sketched out along the lines of the New Policies scenario from the International Energy Agency (IEA). On the more ambitious side, we explore the potential implications of supplying the Indian economy entirely with renewable energies with the “100% renewable energy sources” (100% RES) scenario. Overall, our results suggest that a transformation process towards a low-carbon energy system in the power, heat, and transportation sectors until 2050 is technically feasible. Solar power is likely to establish itself as the key energy source by 2050 in all scenarios, given the model’s underlying emission limits and technical parameters. The paper concludes with an analysis of potential social, economic and political barriers to be overcome for the needed Indian low-carbon transformation.

Role of the transmission grid and solar wind complementarity in mitigating the monsoon effect in a fully sustainable electricity system for India

“…8 a and b give the relative storage utilisation in all the sub‐regions of India. While in the monsoon season, the utilisation of storage technologies decreases, still, storage technologies play an important role in a 100% RE system in India, as found by Lawrenz et al [26].…”

“…While The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) [24] puts forward that such a scenario is desirable for India; however, it maintains that financial and technical policies should be in proper order to make such a scenario realistic. On the other hand, according to Röben and Köhler [25], a 100% RE scenario is feasible and more efficient than the current energy system, while Lawrenz et al [26] conclude that it is technically possible to supply energy for the power, heat and transportation sector entirely by renewables. According to Gulagi et al [27], a 100% RE-based system is technically and economically feasible on an hourly resolution [19,27,28] and also for countries in the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation [29], with the cost structure less than the current system based on fossil fuels.…”

Electricity Generation in India: Present State, Future Outlook and Policy Implications

“…This situation, supported by the fact that the role of nuclear energy is insignificant, means that for the future development of the industrial sector and the growing demand of the civilian population, the structure of electricity generation must be modified [83]. It seems probable that over the long-term horizon, the current structure might not cover the growing demand for electricity due to problems in coal supply, while the switch to low-carbon energy in power, heat, and transportation sectors seems to be (at least technically) feasible [84].…”

Analyzing Scenarios for the Integration of Renewable Energy Sources in the Mexican Energy System—An Application of the Global Energy System Model (GENeSYS-MOD)

“…Löffler et al [14] extended OSeMOSYS to GENeSYS-MOD by including new functionalities, such as a modal split for transportation, an improved trade system and an enhanced focus on environmental budgets. Lawrenz et al [49] further enhanced GENeSYS-MOD in their case study on transition pathways of the Indian energy system, while Burandt et al [34] introduced the second model version, with improvements to storages, time slices and performance optimization (for a detailed description of GENeSYS-MOD and its blocks of functionality, see Appendix C).…”

“…With European [50,51], American [52] and global models [14,53] analyzing different transition pathways and their effect on the aggregated cost of the system. Additionally, the scope of these models have expanded to other regions, like China [54] and India [49,55], as well as to other sectors of the energy system in multi-sectoral models [33]. The latter is of high importance, as most previous studies only target the power sector, omitting significant effects due to sector-coupling.…”