Europe's Dirty 30
Methodological background
WWF commissioned the Institute for Applied Ecology (Öko-Institute) to acquire and analyse data across EU countries regarding absolute and relative carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from Europe’s power stations. Using this data, WWF put together a ranking table to define the European Dirty Thirty, the dirtiest (i.e. most inefficient) of the 30 biggest climate polluting power stations in Europe.
1) Data sources
The calculations of emissions and of the various emission scenarios (see below) are based on data from the following sources:
Starting point for all analyses is the data set provided by the European Pollutant Emission Register (EPER) and the Community Independent Transition Log (CITL) of the European Union Emission Trading Scheme. These sources contain information about CO2 emissions from EU Member States for the years 2004, 2005 and 2006. Only those power plants serving the public power supply are covered.
The CO2 emission data were combined with data on the net electric capacity and the annual average efficiency of the power plants or the respective generating units. These additional data come from various sources, in particular from company information and national and international statistics.
A third data set contains information on the dates of commissioning and the last retrofit measures differentiated by power plant units. These data are available from Platts and from the CoalPower5 database of the International Energy Agency (IEA) and from the operating companies.
2) Ranking Methodology
A two-step approach was used to define the Dirty Thirty. In short, the final ranking is based on the efficiency of the thirty biggest CO2 emitting plants in EU25 countries.
2a) Absolute emissions
First, the Öko-Institut identified the absolute amount of CO2 emissions from European power plants in 2006, using the above-mentioned databases.
WWF then ranked the European power plants according to the amount of CO2 they are emitting, which gave us a ranking of the thirty biggest CO2 emitting plants.
2b) Relative emissions
In a second step, the Öko-Institut used data about the efficiency of the power plants to calculate the relative emissions (grams CO2 per Kilowatt hour) of the thirty biggest emitting power plants.
WWF then used this data to rank the power plants, with the highest (i.e. Number 1) in the final ranking table being the least efficient of the thirty biggest emitting power plants in EU25 countries.
3) Replacement Scenarios
The dates of commissioning and retrofitting of the various generating units were used to derive a projection for the end of their technical lifetime.
Given that the power production for a typical year doesn’t change over the next 30 years, and given that replacement of outdated generating units does not include a change in location, illustrative scenarios were developed for different replacement strategies.
Öko-Institut calculated the absolute CO2 emissions of a power plant for different time horizons (2010, 2020, 2030) by estimating the mix of old and new generating units, taking into account the emission levels of the current generating units and the emission levels of new generating units after replacement.
Base year CO2 emissions were identified, against which the three replacement scenarios can be compared. The base year emissions represent the absolute CO2 emissions from a power plant in 2005 and 2006.
3a) Replacing coal with coal
For the scenarios Coal 2010/20/30 Öko-Institut assumed that every power plant unit which reaches the end of its technical lifetime is replaced by a modern plant with the same fuel. For new hard coal fired power plants an average efficiency of 45 per cent and for new lignite fired power plants an average efficiency of 43 per cent were assumed. For oil fired power plants new plants with an efficiency of 47 per cent were assumed. It was assumed that the current oil fired plants would be replaced by coal fired plants if such a fuel switch was announced by the operators.
3b) Replacing coal with gas
For the scenarios Gas 2010/20/30 Öko-Institut assumed that every power plant unit after its technical lifetime is replaced by a new, highly efficient gas fired combined cycle power plant with an emission level of 365 grams CO2 per Kilowatt hour.
3c) Replacing coal with clean
For the scenarios Renewables 2010/20/30 Öko-Institut assumed that every unit reaching its technical lifetime is replaced by CO2 emission free power generation capacities from renewable energies.
