No. 2, June 2008

Cover story: Beneficial to cut pollution from large plants

Copyright: Lars-Erik Håkansson

 This issue is also available in pdf format: 1.5 MB.

Main articles in brief

Praise where it is due

Many people deserve praise for their contribution to the efforts that in early April culminated in IMO finally reaching agreement to tackle sulphur emissions from international shipping.

Beneficial to cut pollution from large combustion plants

The use of up-to-date emission control techniques in European power plants would drastically reduce emissions of sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides and deliver very significant health benefits across Europe.

Agreement by IMO to curb shipping emissions
Strict new limits for reducing sulphur emissions from ships were finally agreed in April – but action to cut NOx emissions remains insufficient.

High costs linked to pollution from ships
There are remarkable differences in external costs for the various ship categories, ranging from 0.3 to 3.2 eurocent/tonne-kilometre.

Transport is undermining EU climate efforts
“The transport sector has had a free ride for far too long, and big improvements are now required in the sector if the EU is to meet its climate targets,” writes the EEA in a recent assessment.

Nitrogen a major driver of biodiversity loss
New research predicts substantial eff­ects also from low, chronic levels of nitrogen deposition.

Link between ozone and premature death
Short-term exposure to current levels of ozone in many areas is likely to contribute to premature deaths, says a new US National Research Council report.

Tangible climate effects already apparent
To avoid unwanted effects, the level of CO2 in the atmosphere must be reduced to no more than 350 ppm, according to Jim Hansen.

Climate change reduces European air quality

Changes in the European climate can cause significant increases in concentrations of several pollutants, including secondary inorganic particles and ground-level ozone.

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EDITORIAL

Praise where it is due

Many people deserve praise for their contribution to the efforts that in early April culminated in IMO finally reaching agreement to tackle sulphur emissions from international shipping.

It is naturally both risky and difficult to highlight just a few when so many people have contributed, but I’ll take that risk. Special thanks go to:

• Bryan Wood-Thomas, who chaired the negotiations of the air pollution working group, for having succeeded in the task of putting together an ambitious compromise solution that was adopted unanimously by all the countries present.

• The independent tanker owners’ association, Intertanko, for its courage in proposing at an early stage of the negotiations a global transition to low-sulphur (max. 0.5 per cent) distillate fuel – a proposal which when presented in autumn 2006 was challenging, to say the least, but for which Intertanko put forward a well-reasoned and convincing argument.

• Sweden – and in particular Stefan Lemieszewski at the Swedish Maritime Administration – for bringing the issue of air pollution from international shipping on to the agenda back in the 1980s and then doggedly pursuing the issue, and for setting an example through the long-term national use of economic incentives.

• The United States for proposing at an early stage a maximum sulphur content of 0.1 per cent in coastal areas, which in the final agreement was made the limit that will apply in the Emission Control Areas.

• Germany, Finland and Norway, for the compromise solution they set out in the run-up to the negotiations in April, which then paved the way for the final agreement.

• The European Commission, for its work in preparing studies of the costs and environmental benefits of various emission control measures for shipping.

Even though the Swedish NGO Secretariat on Acid Rain is part of the coalition of environmental organizations that has tenaciously applied pressure and lobbied against shipping emissions for many years, I would like to add that this work has also been of great importance. For example, the reports on the health effects of shipping emissions that were commissioned by the environmental organizations helped greatly in bringing the issue on to the political agenda.

The deal on sulphur is good, but it still has to be confirmed by another IMO meeting in October.

More importantly, the measures agreed so far in IMO for reducing NOx emissions are totally inadequate – they are not likely to result in any real reductions in total ship emissions even within the next 15–20 years. Every effort must therefore be made to markedly strengthen the weak NOx emission standards, both for existing and new ships.

In addition, the EU and its member states should expand the Emission Control Areas (ECAs) to include all European sea areas. Currently only the Baltic Sea and the North Sea have ECA status.

To ensure an organized gradual phase-in of low-sulphur fuel, and to speed up the introduction of cleaner fuels and ships, IMO regulations need to be complemented by economic instruments, such as emission charges.

These should be set so as to make it financially worthwhile – at least for ships that regularly frequent the area – to use cleaner fuels or to invest in techniques needed to ensure a distinct reduction in emissions.

Christer Ågren

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LARGE COMBUSTION PLANTS

Beneficial to cut pollution

The use of up-to-date emission control techniques in European power plants would drastically reduce emissions of sulphur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) and deliver very significant health benefits across Europe, according to a new study.1

Application of advanced emission control technologies to the 100 most polluting plants in the EU27 could reduce annual emissions of SO2 and NOx by approximately 3.4 and 1.1 million tonnes respectively (as compared to 2004 levels of emissions). This would cut total EU27 emissions of SO2 by approximately 40 per cent and emissions of NOx by 10 per cent.

When comparing the calculated annual costs of achieving these emission reductions with the estimated health benefits, it was found that the latter are at least three times higher. Such cuts in SO2 and NOx emissions would in addition bring many other benefits that have not been quantified in monetary terms, including less damage to ecosystems and biodiversity through acidification, eutrophication and ground level ozone, and reduced rates of corrosion and weathering of buildings, materials and cultural monuments.

Emissions from large industrial point sources are currently regulated by the EU directives on Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) and Large Combustion Plants (LCP).

In December 2007 the European Commission presented draft legislation to revise these directives, and discussions on this are due in the European Parliament’s environment committee after the summer.

“The findings of this study are important for debates in the European Parliament and the Council on regulating industrial emissions,” says Dragomira Raeva, Air Pollution Officer at the European Environmental Bureau. “We think these are solid reasons to strengthen emission limits for large combustion plants.”

Emission data shows that a relatively small number of plants emit a large fraction of total pollution. The 100 biggest plants provide 40 per cent of the generating capacity and are responsible for approximately half of the SO2 and NOx emissions from all the power plants. Similarly, the 500 biggest plants provide 85 per cent of the capacity, and around 90 per cent of the emissions. See Table 1.

Table 1. EU27 power stations: summary of emissions and costs.

1 BATECT = Best Available Techniques (BAT) in the form of Emission Control Technologies (ECT).

Previous studies of the environmental performance of large combustion plants have also shown that by far the greatest share of emissions comes from old plants. To achieve the emission reductions that are needed over the next five to ten years in order to meet EU aims for air quality and acidification, action will need to be taken on the emissions from these plants.

In this study, the scope for further emission reductions was assessed by theoretically applying the best available emission control techniques to all the power stations. Based on information that included an extensive literature review, it was estimated that applying such techniques would result in removal efficiencies for SO2 of 98 per cent, and for NOx of 90–94 per cent, at each power station.

It is clear that many of the “worst” SO2 and NOx emitters are also significant point sources for emissions of fine particulates and carbon dioxide. Consequently, there is great potential for multiple benefits of smart emission abatement strategies, e.g. the introduction of strict technology forcing emission standards that are designed to promote both energy efficiency and a switch from the dirtiest fuels (e.g. coal) to cleaner, primarily renewable sources of energy. Implementing such stricter emission standards would in itself improve the relative economics of energy efficiency and renewables, thus improving their competitiveness.

“Setting strict mandatory emission limit values for existing large combustion plants would help ensure that the oldest, least efficient, and dirtiest coal-fired plants would be shut down – a win-win solution that will cut emissions of both traditional air pollutants and greenhouse gases,” says Dragomira Raeva.

Cutting emissions of SO2 and NOx from the 100 most polluting plants in the EU27 by more than 90 per cent is estimated to cost about 6.9 billion euro per year, corresponding to an average cost of 1,500 euro per tonne of pollutant reduced.

The health benefits of such emission reductions include avoiding nearly 20,000 premature deaths (or, expressed differently, the gain of more than 200,000 life years) every year. Using the lower valuation of life years lost from the Clean Air For Europe Programme (CAFE) these health benefits are valued at nearly 20 billion euro per year. If the higher CAFE mortality valuation of the value of a statistical life is used instead, the resulting estimated benefits would be about four times higher. See Table 2.

Table 2. Summary results for the 50, 100 and 200 power stations emitting the most NOx+SO2 combined in the EU27.

The study shows that the costs of applying efficient up-to-date emission control techniques to a large fraction of the fossil fuel-fired large combustion plants in Europe are significantly less than the economic benefits of improved health – even though the latter include health benefits solely related to secondary particles (from SO2 and NOx emissions), and the estimated benefits are based on the lower mortality valuation. These benefits would be further extended if other pollutants, such as mercury, were controlled with integrated flue gas treatment technologies.

The study also shows that there is significant variation in the application of emission control technologies between different plants and different countries. Improved application of best available techniques for reducing air pollutant emissions from large industrial point sources could contribute significantly to better air quality in Europe.

Since the retrofitting of abatement techniques, such as selective catalytic reduction (SCR) for reducing nitrogen oxides, can be done relatively quickly, early action to apply this would help some countries avoid breaching their national emissions ceilings for NOx.

Christer Ågren

1 The Costs and Health Benefits of Reducing Emissions from Power Stations in Europe. By Mark Barrett (University College London) and Mike Holland (EMRC). Published by the Swedish NGO Secretariat on Acid Rain and the European Environmental Bureau. Available in pdf format here.

Table 3. Costs and benefits of applying best available emission control techniques at the 20 plants in the EU26 with the largest combined SO2 and NOx baseline emission.