A Life Cycle Analysis of Electricity Generation Technologies Health and Environmental Implications of Alternative Fuels and Technologies

A Life Cycle Analysis of Electricity Generation Technologies: Health and Environmental Implications of Alternative Fuels and Technologies Joule Bergerson & Lester Lave Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center September 2002 Contact Lester Lave: 412-268-8837 or lave@cmu.edu Abstract Increases in electricity demand and the retirement of old generating plants necessitate investment in new generation Increasingly stringent environmental regulations, together with other regulatory requirements and uncertainty over future fuel prices, make the choice of a fuel and technology a difficult decision We review studies examining the life cycle environmental implications of each fuel and technology We focus on the coal fuel cycle for several reasons: (1) More than half of the electricity generated in the USA uses coal as the fuel, (2) historically, the coal fuel cycle has been highly damaging to the environment and to health (3) There are huge coal reserves in the USA, China, and Russia The fuel is inexpensive to mine and likely to be used in large quantities in the future First, we examine the methods for life cycle analysis We then present a brief historical overview of the research studies Finally, we review and critique the alternative methods used for life cycle analysis Our focus is the recent studies of the health and environmental implications of each technology The studies agree that coal mining, transport, and combustion pose the greatest health and environmental costs Among fossil fuel fired generators, natural gas power turbines are the most benign technology Light water nuclear reactors received a great deal of attention in the early literature, but are neglected in recent studies The earlier studies found that the health and environmental costs of light water reactors were low, at least for the portions of the fuel cycle that were evaluated The studies did not evaluate the disposal of spent fuel and so are incomplete Recent advances in life cycle analysis offer a large improvement over the methods of three decades ago and should help in choosing among fuels and technologies as well as modifying designs and practices to lower the health and environmental costs Contents Introduction………………………………………………4 Methods/Analytical Tools……………………………….9 Historical Review…… …………………………………5 Overview of Principal Studies………………………… Boundaries………………………………………………11 Coal……………………… ……………………………12 6.1 Power Plant Characteristics……………………….13 6.2 Mining… ………………………………………….17 6.3 Processing………………………………………… 19 6.4 Composition… ……………………………………20 6.5 Transportation…………………………………… 20 6.6 Generation………………………………………….23 6.7 Transmission……………………………………….24 6.8 Resources………………………………………… 24 6.9 Emissions… ………………………………………25 6.10 Impacts…… …………………………………… 27 6.11 Data Sources………………………….………… 28 6.12 Summary of Results… …………… ………… 30 Other Fuel Cycles……………………………………….38 7.1 Natural Gas………… ……………………………40 7.2 Hydro …………………… …………………… 43 7.3 Oil …………………………………………………45 7.4 Nuclear………………………………………… …47 7.5 Biomass…………………………………………….48 7.6 Wind……………………………………………… 50 7.7 Solar……………………………………………… 51 Conclusions…………………………………………… 53 References………………………………………………54 10 Appendix………………… ………………………… 59 Introduction Two important and controversial issues are reshaping the electricity industry First, the business side of the industry is being turned upside down by “deregulation.” Deregulation is a misnomer since the extent of regulation is not lessening to any great extent, but the nature of the regulation is changing in fundamental ways Generators must decide which plants to build and operate without any assurance that they will receive a return on their investment Second, environmental regulations are becoming significantly more stringent, with the prospect of stringent regulation of carbon dioxide Much more stringent regulation of SOx and NOx results from PM2.5 and ozone standards; mercury discharge standards and perhaps stringent discharge standards for other heavy metals will be costly While the USA has not agreed, even in principle, to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases, we judge stringent standards to be likely in the next decade These issues might be minor, or even academic issues save for the fact that generation owners are faced with decisions about major investments to prolong the lives of current facilities as well as the need to invest in new capacity to meet increasing demand and the retirement of old plants Current environmental regulations are known, but new regulations follow the advance in scientific knowledge, e.g., PM2.5, or a reinterpretation of the data, e.g., mercury The best way of anticipating future regulations is to the best analysis of the full range of environmental discharges and their implications Isn’t this also the best way to help shape or influence good policy? Thus, to make informed decisions, investors need to know the life cycle health and environmental implications of the range of fuels and generation technologies that are available now or will be available shortly Unfortunately, the life cycle implications cannot be known with certainty now However, uncertainty about the implications and each fuel and technology can be reduced by a careful application of current methods A generation shortage would be costly to society First, almost every part of our daily lives requires electricity, from heating and cooling our residences and work places to powering electronics, to lighting, to mass transit Second, electricity is different from other energy forms in that a shortage of generation means that everyone, or at least a large segment of the population, would have no access to electricity If there is a 10% shortage of gasoline, 90% of the demand can be served For electricity, supply and demand must balance at each instant If there is a tiny excess demand, voltage sags If demand outstrips supply by more than a tiny amount, the whole system fails, cutting electricity delivery to everyone If action is taken quickly, a neighborhood could be blacked out, allowing the other customers to continue having access to electricity However, those in the blacked out area would have no access to electricity California experienced electricity shortages in 2001, resulting in rolling blackouts When the traffic lights lost power in San Francisco or other large cities, traffic ceased to flow The point is that an electricity shortage is costly to society We begin with an examination of the methods for life cycle analysis The methods have improved substantially since the first electricity life cycle studies of the 1970s Then, we present a brief historical account of the research literature We focus on the coal fuel cycle since 52% of electricity in the US is generated by burning coal (should the reasons you state earlier not be restated here?) Following this overview, we review of the methods and analytical issues for life cycle analysis Then we present a more extensive review of the modern studies done in the USA, focusing on coal and then treating the other available fuels Finally, we offer some concluding remarks Methods for Life Cycle Analysis Life cycle analysis is undertaken to inform decision makers and help them choose among alternative fuels and technologies for electricity generation An informed choice requires examination of the full cycle, from fuel extraction to transport, generation, and post generation activities This includes an examination of the investments required for these activities The analysis must also include the occupational and public health burden of disease and trauma as well as the impacts on the environment of these activities Modern LCA is divided into four phases: Scoping, discharge inventory, impacts, and improvement (EPA Ref) A comprehensive analysis is impossible: It is not possible to examine the health, energy, materials, and environmental impacts associated with each direct and indirect aspect of each part of the life cycle Thus, each analysis must decide, explicitly or implicitly what will be considered in the analysis and what will be omitted The first LCAs (should we call these studies LCA’s?-perhaps qualify the use of the term here?) focused on the generation and extraction stages, sometimes examining transport They ignored the construction of facilities and other investments (add specific other investments that were ignored) Rather, they focused on direct implications, such as occupational deaths and disease and public health effects from emissions of air pollution and ionizing radiation Even here, the studies were pushing current knowledge since the effects of current ambient levels of air pollution and ionizing radiation were not known with confidence LCA was developed and formalized in the 1990s as the demand for the life cycle implications of a variety of products, from paper cups to automobiles drew public attention EPA and the Society of Environmental Toxicologists and Chemists (SETAC) developed and formalized methods for conducting the analysis The method drew from the LCA of energy and formalized them using the approach of chemical engineering: Conducting mass and energy balances of each phase of the analysis Perhaps the principal contribution of the product analyses was getting people to think about the whole life cycle The quantitative estimates are uncertain and subject to controversy The results can change depending on how the scope is changed Given the difficulty of conducting many energy and materials balances, the scope of the studies has to be tightly drawn and often the balances are not highly detailed The analyses have been found to be time consuming and expensive Precisely the same difficulties have appeared in the LCA for electricity technologies In particular, Holdren (1978) was critical of other studies for not including all the important aspects and for taking insufficient care A new approach to LCA was developed using the national Input-Output table1 (Lave , Hendrickson , … Do you consider this reference to be the best representation of eiolca?) The advantage of this approach is that it is quick and inexpensive The disadvantage is that it is at an aggregate level In particular, the US analysis is done for the 500 sector US input-output matrix We now turn to a brief review of published studies Brief Historical Review The first examination of the life cycle of electricity generation begins in the early 1970s with parallel investigations by Lave and Freeburg (1972, 1973) and Leonard Sagan (1973, 1974) The former resulted from a Sierra Club invitation to help them develop an environmental policy on the most desirable fuel and technology for electricity generation The latter was an Electric Power Research Institute study to help utilities select new generators The results of the two were generally similar They focused on existing plants, rather than the potential of new plants and new technologies Existing plants provide data on their current operation; little more than guesses are possible for the implications of new plants and new technologies Both studies examined the environmental discharges from each process and attempted to quantify the extent of occupational and public illness and injury They used existing studies of the effects of air pollution (such as Lave and Seskin, 1970) and ionizing radiation to estimate the number of cancers that would result from exposure to pollutants and radionuclides Lave and Freeburg emphasize the morbidity and mortality burden from burning coal Sagan emphasizes the large number of public deaths from transporting coal by railroad Both studies found large environmental and health burdens from mining, transporting, and burning coal Both found that oil and natural gas have much smaller environmental and health costs Finally, both found that light water reactors have an even lower health burden, although neither could assess the environmental and health burdens of dealing with spent fuel or decommissioning old reactors (stated below?) Sagan translated the health burdens into dollar terms, assuming that a premature death costs society $300,000 He found that coal had larger health costs ($1.2 million) than nuclear ($210,000) These studies opened the field and ranked the fuels in an order that has stood up over time However, both were incomplete in evaluating all of the aspects of the fuel cycle and neither was able to quantify the environmental effects Hendrickson, C., A Horvath, S Joshi and L.B Lave, "Economic Input-Output Models for Environmental Life Cycle Analysis," Environmental Science & Technology, April, 1998, Vol, 32 Iss, pp 184 A-191 A Morgan, Barkovich and Meier (1973)2 evaluated the social costs associated with producing electricity from coal This paper focuses the evaluation of the costs to society from the activities required to extract and burn coal to produce electricity Although this study does not include stages such as transportation, transmission and waste disposal for this fuel, it has identified some important aspects to be considered in each of the categories that were considered Within the extraction phase, the following factors were considered: land use, mining (including acid mine drainage, subsidence and coal refuse pile hazards), health and safety issues (black lung, mine accidents) In the generation phase the four pollutants most harmful to humans from electricity production from coal (still considered to be today) were evaluated These are SOx, NOx, particulate matter and heavy metals such as mercury The pollutants that were not considered in this study were CO2, heat dissipation and the global impacts of particulate matter and NOx These aspects of the phases considered as well as the other phases involved in electricity production from coal would need to be included in order to produce a complete LCA Soon after the publication of these studies, several studies were published in the first volume of the Annual Review of Energy Lave and Silverman (1976) review the economics of environmental pollution beginning with a discussion of neoclassical economic theory A competitive market is efficient under assumptions that each firm is a price taker (no market power) and no externalities Clearly, the US economy in 1976 had important externalities, especially in the production and use of energy generally and electricity in particular If these externalities are not treated, competitive markets will come to inefficient outcomes, e.g., the terrible air and water pollution in Pittsburgh in 1945 However, if the externalities are internalized by regulation or effluent fees, free markets will produce efficient outcomes They also discuss the application of various tools to assess the economics of environmental pollution including benefit-cost analysis, input-output analysis and the materials balance model The approaches to environmental management include setting standards, effluent fees, or capping total discharges and allowing firms to trade "allowances." The resources that were included in the first edition of the Annual Review of Energy include coal, nuclear, solar, geothermal, oil shale, nuclear fusion, waster materials, and hydrogen energy The technologies included clean liquids and gaseous fuels from coal as well as energy storage and advanced energy conversion This list excluded the discussion of natural gas It was generally believed at the time that natural gas reserves available would inhibit this fuel form becoming a significant fraction of electricity capacity in the United States Natural gas is currently used to generate approximately 14%3 of the electricity in the US This implies that this assumption is no longer valid Morgan, M.G Barkovich, B.R Meier, A.K The Social Costs of Producing Electric Power from Coal: A FirstOrder Calculation Proceedings of the IEEE Vol 61 No 10 pp 1431-1442 Oct 1973 EIA-DOE Table U.S Electric Power Industry Summary Statistics Electric Power Monthly http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/epmt02p1.html Viewed Sept 10, 2002 Zebroski and Levenson (1976) make one of the first attempts at a nuclear fuel cycle analysis Much of this paper is dedicated to discussing the performance of light-water reactors including issues affecting the efficiency of the reactors as well as possible remedies In the discussion of the incremental costs associated with nuclear power generation they conclude that the shipping, reprocessing, and waste disposal costs were only estimated to be 6% of the total cost of nuclear fuel The reprocessing of plutonium is no longer conducted in the US and the environmental impacts involved with reprocessing are actually much greater than mentioned in this paper The entire discussion of reprocessing, recycling, spent fuel storage and radioactive waste disposal would have to be revisited in light of developments in the nuclear power industry since this paper was written The details of the cost estimates were not discussed but an incremental cost advantage for nuclear over coal was concluded They estimated that the cost of nuclear was only 20% of the cost of coal and they estimated that this advantage would increase in the future The study shows that the capital costs of nuclear plants are higher than coal but they noted a decrease and predicted a future decrease in this cost advantage The true cost of nuclear fuel is still unknown however, the capital costs of nuclear power still exceed coal power plants Morse and Simmons (1976) review the various solar technologies and applications being developed at the time for feasibility and preparedness for large scale implementation5 They included solar thermal conversion, photovoltaic conversion, production of fuels, wind energy, and ocean thermal conversion in their discussion This paper measured and compared the cost effectiveness of each of these technologies These calculations attempted to account for the fact that in the future these technologies would become cheaper due to mass production, technological improvement etc While the authors suggest that the full environmental consequences had to be examined and that the upstream impacts also needed to be considered, they neglected to so in much of their evaluation They suggest that the use of gallium in the solar technology industry would be a substantial part of the cost of solar energy but would also have the economic effect of driving the price of gallium up for other industries However, this Zebroski, E Levenson, M The Nuclear Fuel Cycle Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 101-130 1976 Morse, F.H Simmons, M.K Solar Energy Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 131-158 1976 study neglects to include the environmental impacts of extracting, processing and use of the gallium This would be required in evaluating the true environmental implications as suggested in this paper and this impact is significant They suggest that the energy requirement would also have to be addressed as this would be one of the largest material requirements, however, they discuss this in economic terms and not in terms of environmental impact They did rightly conclude, however, that solar energy would not make up a large portion of energy capacity in the US before 1985 Kruger (1976) investigated the potential for geothermal energy6 This paper suggested that there is great potential for geothermal energy primarily for generating electric power However, in 2001 geothermal power only accounted for 6% of the total US electric power generation While the environmental impacts were identified as gaseous emissions, liquid waste disposal, and geophysical effects such as seismicity and subsidence, there was no attempt made to quantify or compare these impacts Rattien and Eaton (1976) looked at the potential for oil shale Numerous serious environmental impacts are identified in this discussion and the technologies discussed that have feasibility not consider electric generation potential Petroleum in general produces very little (5%) of the US electricity capacity today Post (1976) discusses nuclear fusion, its potential as well as potential environmental impacts This paper focuses on the science and technologies that could be possible in the future including techniques for “the conversion of fusion plasma energy directly into electricity without the use of a heat cycle” They identify that like current fission plants, this process will involve hazardous radiation but they still conclude that “it appears likely that fusion reactors, particularly as they evolve, will present a smaller hazard to man and to the environment than any other major power source with the exception of solar power” This is contrary to current evaluations of the impact of radiation and catastrophic possibilities Kruger, P Geothermal Energy Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 159-182 1976 Rattien, S Eaton, D Oil Shale: The Prospects and Problems of an Emerging Energy Industry Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 183-212 1976 Post, R.F Nuclear Fusion Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 213-255 1976 Golueke and McGauhey (1976) discuss the use of waste materials as a possible energy source9 They investigate the potential sources and uses for energy generated from waste However, very few of these technologies have been implemented on a large scale In addition, this paper neglects to investigate the environmental implications of generating the energy using the methods described in the paper Gregory and Pangborn (1976) discuss hydrogen energy as an alternative to electricity in various applications10 These include industrial feedstocks, industrial fuel, residential appliances, and catalytic combustion They also suggest that hydrogen could be used as a fuel for electricity generation but state that the high cost of hydrogen will likely make its use in this manner unattractive Kalhammer and Schneider (1976) state that “energy storage can improve the operation and economics of electric power systems”11 They discuss the potential technologies for doing this Somers and Berg (1976) discuss advanced energy conversion12 The main premise of this paper is that the generation of electricity will shift to prominently be done using coal and nuclear in the future and therefore, a stress on increasing the efficiency of these power plants will be eminent They suggest that this will be addressed by using advanced energy conversion to convert the waste heat from steam and gas turbines to electricity The combined-cycle gas–turbine power plant is a good example of something that has been implemented today However fuel cells have yet to realize this same success Although this still has potential today, it has been suggested that this might not be the most efficient use of the waste heat There might be a greater gain made if the waste heat was used for heating the buildings near the power plant etc Golueke, C.G., McGauhey, P.H Waste Materials Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 257 – 277 1976 Gregory, D.P Pangborn, J.B Hydrogen Energy Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 79-310 1976 11 Kalhammer, F.R Schneider, T.R Energy Storage Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 311-343 1976 12 Somers, E.V Berg, D Fickett, A.P Advanced Energy Conversion Annual Review of Energy Vol pp 345 – 389 1976 10 10 Biomass is a renewable energy with a lot of potential for replacing a portion of the current electricity production82 This fuel cycle is receiving greater and greater interest among the scientific community as a potential option for electricity generation There is still, however, much controversy over the science involved in evaluating this fuel cycle and therefore, numerous studies have been produced of late, which attempt to evaluate the environmental implications of this fuel cycle One such study compared an integrated gasification combined cycle plant which was fired by dedicated energy crops (poplar short rotation forestry) to a conventional power plant83 This study confirmed what was found in the Oak Ridge study that there is equivalence between CO2 biomass combustion emissions and CO2 absorption during the growth of plants It was concluded that biomass had less environmental impact in almost all of the eco-indicators and normalized effects considered in this study However, it was acknowledged that modifications to the process of biomass production would help to reduce the environmental impact It was identified that the most significant environmental effects from this fuel cycle are caused by the use of chemicals and fertilizers and it was suggested that the use of these could be optimized Additionally, it was suggested that biodiesel could be used in the agricultural machinery which would reduce the CO2 emitted The consideration and presentation of the eco-indicators in this study was well done One study applied a method similar to life cycle analysis in order to assess the sustainability of ten potential energy crops in four European regions84 The crops considered in this study included rape seed, sugar beet, winter wheat, silage maize, hemp, miscanthus, poplar, willow and grass fallow One of the general conclusions from this study was that the use of crops to generate electricity is preferred to their use as transport fuels from both an ecological and socioeconomical criteria It was also concluded that annual crops for electricity routes such as hemp should be considered for the Netherlands both for ecological and economic reasons Finally, financial incentives are required to make these crops competitive fuels for electricity generation Another study investigated the externalities of biomass based electricity production compared with power generation from coal in the Netherlands85 This study looked at the effects on economic activity and employment through the use of input/output and multiplier tables The average private costs of biomass were found to be almost double that of coal power generation In analyzing the coal fuel cycle, coal mining was excluded however This might have changed the results somewhat The authors of this paper felt that the main sources of comparison between these two fuel types were the indirect economic effects as well as the CO2 emissions 82 Wyman, C.E Biomass Ethanol: Technical Progress, Opportunities, and Commercial Challenges Annual Review of Energy and the Environment Vol 24 pp 189-226 1999 83 Rafaschieri, A Rapaccini, M Manfrida, G Life Cycle Assessment of Electricity Production From Poplar Energy Crops Compared with Conventional Fossil Fuels Energy Conversion and Management Vol 40 pp 14771493 1999 84 Hanegraaf, M.C Biewinga, EE Van der Bijl, G Assessing the Ecological and Economic Sustainability of Energy Crops Biomass and Bioenergy Vol 15 pp 345-355 1998 85 Faaij, A Meuleman, B Turkenburg, W Van Wijk, A Bauen, A Rosillo-Calle, F and Hall, D Externalities of Biomass Based Electricity Production Compared with Power Generation From Coal in the Netherlands Biomass and Bioenergy Vol 14 No pp 125-147 1998 53 Many other studies focus on the greenhouse gas emissions of this fuel cycle86 while others insist that considering ecological and socio-economic sustainability of biomass crops 87 is essential to gaining a clear perspective of this fuel cycle A comparison of co-combustion between different biofuels and hard coal and electricity production from hard coal alone has also been conducted88 Other studies have compared biomass to both coal and natural gas89 The Oak Ridge study entitled “Estimating Externalities of Biomass Fuel Cycles” was published in 1998 This study investigated two hypothetical plants This study asserted that evaluating the costs and benefits of the externalities might change the perceived “potential” for this fuel The impacts considered in this study include the following: Fuel Stage Impacts  change in habitat from altered land uses Tree Plantations  change in biodiversity  erosion of topsoil  suspended sediments  herbicides in surface waters  occupational health risks  health risks to members of public  Truck traffic Truck Traffic  ozone on agricultural crops Biomass Combustion  ozone on human health  SO2 on health  NOx on health  Employment  Asthetics This study concluded that there are significant differences in damages and thus externalities, among different sites (for example, benefits from erosion reduction differ by a factor of three) and for different biomass technologies The use of advanced biomass conversion technologies could reduce NOx emissions significantly compared to conventional wood burners It was found that this biomass fuel cycle has near-zero emissions of CO2 This study therefore concluded that, 86 Jungmeier, G Spitzer, J Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Bioenergy From Agriculture Compared to Fossil Energy for Heat and Electricity Supply Nutrient Cycling in Agroecosystems Vol 60 Iss 1-3 pp 267-273 2001 87 Spath, P.L Mann, M K Net Energy and Global Warming Potential of Coal-Fired Electricity with CO2 Sequestration Compared to Biomass Power – A Life Cycle Approach NREL Conference: th Biomass Conference of the Americas, Orlando, FL (USA), 17-21 September 88 Hartmann, D Kaltschmitt, M Electricity Generation From Solid Biomass Via Co-combustion with Coal – Energy and Emission Balances From a German Case Study Biomass and BioEnergy Vol 16 pp 397-406 1999 89 Spath, P.L Mann, M K Life Cycle Assessment Comparisons of Electricity from Biomass, Coal and Natural Gas Conference: 5th Biomass Conference of the Americas, Orlando, FL (Usa), 17-21 September 2000 54 compared to fossil fuel cycles, biomass is a less environmentally harmful fuel cycle in terms of impacts on global climate change 7.6 Wind Wind power has been used by man for thousands of years It has been used to generate electricity (on a small scale) since the early to mid 1900s90 By 1995, it was estimated that there were 17,000 commercial wind turbines in the United States Most wind turbines convert the wind power to DC current The main advantages of wind are that the generation of electricity phase of the fuel cycle does not emit environmentally harmful pollutants However, there are several major issues to consider when considering wind for large scale use First, the amount of wind required to generate enough electricity to make the process cost-effective is not present everywhere Second, wind speed is variable Third, the consistency of wind is also variable Fourth, there are environmental impacts associated with the manufacture of the wind turbines as well as the land used for the wind turbine A review was recently conducted in order to understand the uncertainties and variability in results among previous studies concerning the environmental impact of wind turbines91 This study provides a table summarizing the studies that have been conducted This table shows the year of study, the location of the wind system studied, whether it was a conceptual or operating system, the energy intensity and CO2 intensity considered, the power rating, life time of the system, load factor, analysis type (e.g process or input-output), the scope (e.g construction and operation phases), turbine type, rotor diameter, tower height wind speed and rated remarks This study found that although the structure and technology of most modern wind turbines is very similar around the world, the results of the life cycle assessments conducted to date are very different due to variability in each studies assessment of the contents of materials, national fuel mixes chosen as well as the method and scope of each study This study suggests the employment of input-output based hybrid techniques in order to minimize the uncertainties as well as using a standardized method of assessment A general review of the technology, design, trends and their subsequent environmental impact have also been conducted92 90 Hazen, M.E Alternative Energy: An Introduction to Alternative & Renewable Energy Sources Prompt Publications 1996 91 Lenzen, M Munksgaard, J Energy and CO Life-Cycle Analyses of Wind Turbines – Review and Applications Renewable Energy Vol 26 Iss pp 339-362 2002 92 McGowan, J.G Connors, S.R Windpower: A Turn of the Century Review Annual Review of Energy and the Environment Vol 25 pp 147-197 2000 55 7.7 Solar The sun is the earth’s greatest source of energy and therefore, the possibilities of using this form of energy to meet the electricity demands of people on earth should continue to be investigated The sun radiates energy (approx 2.1*1015 kWh per day on earth)93 This is in the form of electromagnetic radiation Solar energy that is being used to generate electricity is either solar thermal or photovoltaic Solar thermal technology uses the radiation directly to heat water or other materials including focusing the radiation to generate steam Photovoltaic technology converts the sun’s rays directly to electrical energy94 One of the advantages of solar radiation is that the conversion of electromagnetic radiation to electricity occurs without environmentally harmful emissions However, other stages of the fuel cycle contribute to environmental damage One of the major environmental issues with this fuel cycle is the manufacture and disposal of cells and other equipment required to capture the radiation before it is transformed into electricity Another issue is that this fuel cycle is not currently being used on a large scale anywhere in the world Therefore, it is difficult to assess the life cycle implications by assessing prototypes and subsequently scaling the calculations up to a level where it can be compared to conventional fuels This problem is common to most renewable technologies Many studies evaluate the environmental implications of fuel cycles in terms of their contribution to global warming however, if other environmental impacts are not also addressed (for example, toxic chemicals are used in the manufacture of some solar products) then incorrect conclusions can be drawn as to which fuel cycle has the least environmental impact Several studies have attempted to quantify the environmental impacts of these forms of electricity generation as well as comparing these impacts with those of traditional electricity generation using fuels such as coal95 One study attempted to estimate the level of atmospheric pollutants emitted during the manufacturing process of solar water heating systems96 This study employed life cycle analysis and compared these results to pollutant emission levels to conventional power plants in Greece The conclusions of this study were that the gaseous pollutant emissions from the production solar water heating systems are much less than generating electricity through conventional means Another study evaluated the environmental life cycle implications of a nanocrystalline dye sensitized solar cell and compared this to a natural gas combined cycle power plant 97 This evaluation focused on CO2 and SO2 emissions per kWh It found that the gas power plant emitted close to 10 times the CO2 emissions of the solar cell It was also identified that the biggest impact from the solar cell was the process energy for producing the solar cell module 93 Hazen, M.E Alternative Energy: An Introduction to Alternative & Renewable Energy Sources Prompt Publications 1996 94 Hazen, M.E Alternative Energy: An Introduction to Alternative & Renewable Energy Sources Prompt Publications 1996 95 Norton, B Eames, P.C Lo, S.N.G Full-Energy Chain Analysis of Greenhouse Gas Emissions For Solar Thermal Electric Power Generation Systems Renewable Energy Vol 15 Iss 1-4 pp 131-136 Sep-Dec 1998 96 Mirasgedis, S Diakoulaki, D Assimacopoulos, D Solar Energy and the Abatement of Atmospheric Emissions Renewable Energy Vol no pp 329-338 1996 97 Greijer, H Karlson, L Lindquist, S-E Hagfeldt, A Environmental Aspects of Electricity Generation from a Nanocrystalline Dye Sensitized Solar Cell System Renewable Energy Vol 23, no pp 27-39 May 2001 56 Another study looked at a photovoltaic generator and used the life cycle energy cost analysis to compare it to fuel generators (kerosene and diesel) This study found that at current market prices, the photovoltaic generators were comparable or less expensive than the fuel generators (Koner) A third study focused on the environmental implications of building and operating electric power plants98 This study constructed a global warming effect index which basically summarizes the various emissions that contribute to global warming and projects these emissions over the life of the power plant It was found that a medium sized photovoltaic plant (of 1MW capacity) produces a global warming effect which is times less than that of a coal plant over the course of its life Another publication listed the toxic and flammable/explosive gases that are of concern in photovoltaic power systems are silane, phosphine and germane as well as cadmium Recycling the cell materials is possible but the environmental consequences of that must be considered first Depletion of rare materials is also a concern The use of hazardous compressed gases in PV manufacturing The trend is going towards thinner more efficiently manufactured cells (that use less material) Other greenhouse gases can be used in PV manufacturing such as SF6 and CF4 Energy use in the manufacturing stage is the largest contributor to emissions The fuel mix considered in looking at this energy use (specifically electricity) is important and varies depending on where the cell in manufactured A LCA of solar systems should consider the system integration aspects such as energy storage and the treatment of imports and exports (Utrecht Workshop) – generally concludes that solar has no environmental impacts large enough to hinder its replacement of fossil fuel in the generation of electricity The main environmental impacts considered in this paper were energy use (mostly in production), resource depletion (e.g the resource availability for indium (used in CIS modules) and silver (used in microcrystalline-SI modules), climate change (mostly from energy use but the overall effect is the reduction of GHG when compared to CO2), health and safety (continuous or accidental releases of hazardous materials can pose a risk towards workers and the public, waste, and land use This paper stresses that the life-cycle approach is needed for the assessment of environmental aspects of PV power systems because they mostly occur at the life-cycle stages other than the operation of the PV power system itself (i.e manufacturing, end-of-life waste management) An economic inputoutput model is also suggested This paper states that current environmental control technologies are sufficient to control wastes and emissions in today’s production facilities The general conclusion that was drawn from study was that the immediate risks from the production and operation of PV modules to human health or the ecosystem seem to be relatively small and well manageable This study also found that the factors that affect he energy pay-back times include cell technology, PV system application and irradiation The data from recent studies show that although for present-day systems the energy pay-back time can still be high, it is generally well below the expected lifetime of a PV system Previous LCA studies showed that the emissions are mostly from the energy (electricity mostly) used in producing the PV It also stressed that what the system is compared to also strongly influences the results For example, comparing the emissions from a PV power plant to an old technology coal-fired power plant will show a much 98 Pacca, S Horvath, A Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Building and Operating Electric Power Plants Submitted for Publication 2002 57 greater savings in emissions than if the PV plant was compared to a brand new natural gas power plant One study did find, however, that the health and safety risk posed by solar systems is far greater than the one attributed to technologies using conventional or nuclear fuels (see in Greek paper) A new “solar chimney” is currently being planned in Australia which would have very different environmental implications than previous solar technologies investigated, especially if it became used on a large scale99 A life cycle analysis of this technology would undoubtedly provide insight into renewable fuels and the infrastructure issues that are associated with them in addition to the overall competitiveness of this particular technology The following is a summary of recent studies 8.0 Conclusions (This still needs to be re-written!) A substantial amount of work has explored the life cycle analysis of electricity This work has developed both the framework and method as well as conducting life cycle analysis and interpreting of the results This base of information and lessons learned are essential to building a framework applicable to the current discussions regarding the environmental implications of various fuel cycles in the production of electricity While each of the studies reviewed in this paper evaluated various aspects of each of the fuel cycles in a well-defined manner, improvements can be made for future research This means incorporating the best aspects of the previous studies In addition, it is important to focus the analysis on answering current policy and decision questions related to the choice of fuels and the technologies used to generate electricity Finally, incorporation of various impacts that have been neglected in previous analyzes and the application of the eiolca method will result in a life 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