Emission forecasting

Uncertainty in future allowance prices leads to delay in investment decisions. By waiting, a company gains more knowledge about future C02 prices, and thereby makes better decisions. Furthermore, in the presence of price uncertainty, risk aversion is also likely to reduce investment.40 The risk of low C02 prices, or even a price crash due to allocations based on high emission forecasts, represents a significant hurdle for investment in low-carbon investments. Obviously, companies are prepared to bear risks, but they generally prefer to take risks in their core business, where this can create strategic opportunities.41... 

Differences Between Models. As described above, there are several reasons for making emission forecasts. A nunber of models exist that have been developed to provide such forecasts. Ihe differences between the models cause one model to be more appropriate for certain types of analyses than another model. 

Figure 1. Emission forecasts under alternative utility coal plant lifetime assumptions.

The path set by the current energy policy of the United States and the developing world will dramatically increase greenhouse gas emissions over the next few decades, which will force sharper and more painful reductions in the future when we finally do act. In the United States, the transportation sector alone is projected to generate nearly half of the 40 percent rise in co2 emissions forecast for 2025, which is long before hydrogen-powered cars could have a positive effect on greenhouse gas emissions (see Chapter 8). 

Figure 5.3. Danish historical emissions, business-as-usual (BAU) emission forecast and 2005-2007 allocations in Mt CO2 from installations covered by the Emissions Trading Directive.

In recent years, the gas emission forecasting technology has been gained more and more attention in the world s coal-producing countries, they put a lot of human and financial resources to conduct technical researching, have obtained many reference experience and research results. 

Nesvijski, E.G., Nogin, S.I. Acoustic Emission Technics for Nondestructive Evaluation of Stress of Concrete and Reinforced Concrete Structures and Materials. Third Conference on Nondestructive Evaluation of Civil Structures and Materials, Boulder, CO, 1996. Nesvijski, E. G. Failure Forecast and the Acoustic Emission Silence Effect in Concrete. ASNT s Spring Conference, Houston, TX, 1997. 

The impact of the regulations in Table 4 is to require users and producers of VOC ketones to limit release by either reformulating to new solvent systems, to install environmental control systems which recover and recycle solvents, or reduce emissions with carbon absorption beds or incineration equipment. The use of some individual ketones will decline further, but the overall short-term use of ketones is forecast to remain stable (10). 

Models for forecasting the greenhouse gas emission in livestock farms... 

C02 emissions from waste account for a large amount. Waste generation each year is 13 million tons nationwide, of which, 75% was buried mostly in the open dumps. Based on forecast data 2015-2020, municipal waste volume will be two to three times higher than at present. Statistics emissions from not handled organic waste are about 75 million tons of C02 - that will be about 113 million tons in 2020 as being forecasted. 

Matos and de Sousa (1992) and Matos and Aires (1995) have, based on empirical expressions for the emission rate and adsorption rate on the sewer walls of H2S, used Equation (4.23) as a basis for a model for forecasting the buildup of H2S in the sewer atmosphere. The expressions included in this model are detailed in Matos and de Sousa (1992). 

In 1950 the U.S. C02 emissions were almost 40% of the global total. By 1975 this had dropped to about 25%, and by the late 1980s it was about 22%. If the U.S. held emissions constant at 1985 levels, a reduction of 15% from the emissions in 1995 and a 28% reduction from the forecast emissions in 2010, then global emissions would be reduced by only 3% in 1995 and 6% in 2010. Even if U.S. emissions were cut by 50% below the 1985 levels, global emissions would continue to grow and would drop by less than 15% in the year 2010. This supports the assumption that world emissions will continue to grow. 

The time-series analysis results of Merz et were expressed in first-order empirical formulas for the most part. Forecasting expressions were developed for total oxidant, carbon monoxide, nitric oxide, and hydrocarbon. Fitting correlation coefficients varied from 0.547 to 0.659. As might be expected, the best results were obtained for the primary pollutants carbon monoxide and nitric oxide, and the lowest correlation was for oxidant. This model relates one pollutant to another, but does not relate emission to air quality. For primary pollutants, the model expresses the concentrations as a function of time. 

Another aspect of matching output to user needs involves presentation of results in a statistical framework—namely, as frequency distributions of concentrations. The output of deterministic models is not directly suited to this task, because it provides a single sample point for each run. Analytic linkages can be made between observed frequency distributions and computed model results. The model output for a particular set of meteorologic conditions can be on the frequency distribution of each station for which observations are available in sufficient sample size. If the model is validated for several different points on the frequency distribution based on today s estimated emission, it can be used to fit a distribution for cases of forecast emission. The fit can be made by relating characteristics of the distribution with a specific set of model predictions. For example, the distribution could be assumed to be log-normal, with a mean and standard deviation each determined by its own function of output concentrations computed for a standardized set of meteorologic conditions. This, in turn, can be linked to some effect on people or property that is defined in terms of the predicted concentration statistics. The diagram below illustrates this process ... 

Since this estimated share pattern was derived mainly from projection of trends (particularly long term trends), it seems appropriate to focus on oil and speculate as to how possible future events might alter its forecast future role. Events related to pollution control tend to indicate increases in petroleum demand. The use of lead free gasoline, for instance, requires additional refinery processing, which in turn consumes more petroleum fuel. Increasingly tighter controls on sulfur dioxide emissions from thermal-electric plants will cause a shift from coal to low sulfur fuel oil if there is no economic flue-gas desulfurization to cope with coals sulfur content. 

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