本文转自《World Economic Forum》发表的题为“Is this technology the answer to our CO2 emissions problem?”的报道。

作者：Brad Page  GCCSI的CEO

日期：2019.01.19

原文链接：https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/01/is-this-technology-the-answer-to-our-co2-emissions-problem/

Carbon capture and storage can play a crucial in solving our CO2 problem

碳捕集和封存对解决我们的二氧化碳问题至关重要

This article is part of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting

本文是世界经济论坛年会的一部分

Climate change is rattling the world. 2018 was the worst year to date in terms of emissions.

气候变化正在撼动世界。 2018年是迄今为止排放量最差的一年。

Scientists predict a gloomy future: one of misery, destruction and catastrophe. But the climate debate remains highly polarized. The world is too busy picking winners and losers and pitting technologies against each other. We are losing sight of what needs to be done: solving our CO2 problem.

科学家们预测未来将是一个悲观的：痛苦，破坏和灾难。 但气候争论仍然高度分化。 世界忙于挑选赢家和输家，并使技术相互对立。 我们正在忽视需要做的事情：解决我们的二氧化碳问题。

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) has to play an important part in getting this job done. CCS is a set of technologies that prevents CO2 emissions from entering the atmosphere and stores them safely underground in dedicated geological storage, and it can play a key role in reducing emissions and achieving global climate targets. This technology is also an enabler of negative emissions, through extracting CO2 from the atmosphere.

碳捕集与封存（CCS）必须在完成这项工作中发挥重要作用。 CCS是一套技术，可以防止二氧化碳排放进入大气层并将其安全地储存在专用的地质储存中，并且可以在减少排放和实现全球气候目标方面发挥关键作用。 通过从大气中提取二氧化碳，该技术也是负排放的推动者。

Often decried as an expensive and unproven fig-leaf for the fossil fuel industry, the reality - that we cannot combat climate change without CCS - is, for many, an inconvenient truth.

经常被认为是化石燃料行业昂贵且未经证实的无花果，现实 - 我们无法在没有CCS的情况下应对气候变化 - 对许多人而言，这是一个不方便的事实。

A map of existing and planned CCS facilities around the world Image: Global CCS Institute

世界各地现有和规划的CCS设施地图：GCCSI

The Paris climate agreement – in which the world has agreed to limit global warming to well below 2˚C – cannot be reached without CCS. The International Energy Agency’s Sustainable Development Scenario, which outlines the world’s path to reaching the energy-related UN Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Agreement, forecasts that at least 7% of emissions reductions will need to come from CCS.

如果没有CCS，巴黎气候协议 - 世界同意将全球变暖限制在2˚C以下 - 是不可能的。 国际能源机构的可持续发展情景概述了世界实现与能源相关的联合国可持续发展目标和巴黎协议的途径，预测至少7％的减排需要来自CCS。

Here’s one of the reasons why. Despite the acceleration of the green energy revolution, the world is expected to continue to depend on fossil fuels for its primary energy demand in the decades to come. According to the IEA, fossil fuels satisfy 81% of primary energy demand today. In the Sustainable Development Scenario this number is forecast to fall to 60%.

这是其中一个原因。 尽管绿色能源革命加速发展，但预计世界将继续依赖化石燃料来满足未来几十年的主要能源需求。 根据IEA，化石燃料目前满足81％的一次能源需求。 在可持续发展情景中，预计这一数字将降至60％。

Ceasing construction of unabated sources of emissions is a must. Reports show that the world is at risk of locking in its emissions iby continuing to build coal plants without CCS today. While investments and the number of final investment decisions for coal plants without CCS have declined, unabated coal-fired power generation needs to decrease by 5.6% annually until 2030 to meet the Sustainable Development Scenario. And this calculation doesn’t even include all other unabated sources of emissions currently under construction. This infrastructure in total is expected to account for 95% of the world’s remaining total carbon budget until 2040. Deploying CCS to capture emissions from the industrial and power sectors is the only viable solution.

停止建设有增无减的排放源是必须的。 报告显示，由于今天没有CCS继续建造煤电厂，世界面临着锁定其排放的风险。 虽然没有CCS的燃煤电厂的投资和最终投资决策数量有所下降，但直到2030年，未减少的燃煤发电需要每年减少5.6％才能实现可持续发展情景。 此计算甚至不包括目前正在建设的所有其他未减排的排放源。 到2040年，这个基础设施预计将占世界剩余碳总预算的95％。部署CCS以捕获工业和电力部门的排放是唯一可行的解决方案。

Carbon capture will enable a just transition for workers currently employed in the energy sector. It will build new low-carbon industries, repurpose existing infrastructure and keeping industries competitive in a low-carbon future.

碳捕获将为目前在能源领域工作的工人实现公平过渡。 它将建立新的低碳产业，重新利用现有的基础设施，并保持行业在低碳未来的竞争力。

CCS will help renewables thrive. Clean, dispatchable, back-up power – for example provided by natural gas plants with CCS – will be able to balance the intermittent nature of wind and solar generation while keeping costs down. In fact, researchers have found that CCS can reduce overall system costs and capacity requirements. In the US, innovators are already working on a next-generation natural gas power plant which is meant to provide reliable and flexible carbon-free power at cost-parity with conventional combined cycle gas power plants.

CCS将帮助可再生能源蓬勃发展。清洁，可调度的备用电源 - 例如由CCS天然气厂提供 - 将能够在保持成本降低的同时平衡风能和太阳能发电的间歇性。事实上，研究人员发现CCS可以降低整体系统成本和容量要求。在美国，创新者已经在开发下一代天然气发电厂，旨在以与传统联合循环燃气发电厂相比成本平价提供可靠和灵活的无碳发电。

CCS remains the only technology that can deliver deep emissions reductions in hard-to-abate industrial sectors such as steel, petrochemicals and cement. After steel, the cement industry is the second-biggest source of industrial emissions, currently accounting for 6% of global carbon emissions. As population growth and urbanization are expected to reach unprecedented levels, so will temissions from these industrial processes whose product demand is tightly correlated with economic expansion. CCS is the only technology available to deeply decarbonize these two sectors. In these sectors, CCS will also help to keep the cost of abatement down. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) found that a climate technology-mix without CCS will likely result in more than double the cost to reach 2oC and that it is doubtful that the objective can even be achieved without CCS. Two promising projects in the cement industry in Norway and Belgium are currently underway.

CCS仍然是唯一能够在钢铁，石化和水泥等难以减少的工业部门实现深度减排的技术。在钢铁之后，水泥行业是第二大工业排放源，目前占全球碳排放量的6％。随着人口增长和城市化预计将达到前所未有的水平，这些工业流程的产品需求与经济扩张密切相关。 CCS是唯一可以对这两个部门进行深度脱碳的技术。在这些领域，CCS还将有助于降低减排成本。国际气候变化专门委员会（IPCC）发现，没有CCS的气候技术组合可能会使成本达到2oC的两倍以上，而且如果没有CCS，甚至可以实现这一目标是值得怀疑的。目前正在挪威和比利时的水泥行业开展两个有希望的项目。

In the long run, CCS can become the foundation of a new clean and sustainable energy economy. The production of low-cost hydrogen with CCS opens a plethora of opportunities for this energy vector in industry, heat, transportation and energy production. In the UK, for instance, the CCS-equipped HyNet North West facility is expected to produce hydrogen for industrial sites, home heating and as transportation fuel. The project could potentially serve more than 2 million homes and businesses. And the H21 North of England project aims to convert part of the northern UK gas grid to hydrogen decarbonized with CCS.

从长远来看，CCS可以成为新的清洁和可持续能源经济的基础。 使用CCS生产低成本氢气为工业，热能，运输和能源生产中的能源载体开辟了大量机会。 例如，在英国，配备CCS的HyNet North West工厂预计将为工业场所，家庭供暖和运输燃料生产氢气。 该项目可能为200多万家庭和企业提供服务。 H21英格兰北部项目旨在将部分英国北部天然气网转换为使用CCS脱碳的氢气。

As the world continues to emit more CO2, it is likely to overshoot its climate goals. Direct air capture (DAC) technologies, albeit nascent, will be able to suck CO2 out of the air. The deployment of CCS provides learning opportunities and infrastructure for these early technologies.

随着世界继续排放更多的二氧化碳，它可能会超过其气候目标。 直接空中捕获（DAC）技术虽然刚刚起步，但能够从空气中吸收二氧化碳。 CCS的部署为这些早期技术提供了学习机会和基础设施。

Currently, CCS deployment is off-track. There are 43 large-scale CCS facilities – 18 in commercial operation, five under construction and 20 in various stages of development around the world. Projections estimate that by 2040, we will need more than 2,000. While abundant storage is mapped and available to trap hundreds of years of emissions, there is still a long way to go in terms of policy and deployment.

目前，CCS部署偏离轨道。 共有43个大型CCS设施 - 其中18个在商业运营，5个在建，20个在世界各地的不同发展阶段。 预测估计，到2040年，我们将需要超过2,000个。 虽然可以映射大量存储并可用于捕获数百年的排放，但在政策和部署方面仍有很长的路要走。

The first step would be to recognize that there is no silver bullet. We can no longer afford to ignore CCS, or talk about one solution vs another; the goal must be to eliminate CO2. We need energy efficiency. We need renewable energy. We need CCS. It’s time to embrace an all-encompassing approach to clean energy globally – one with consistent government and private sector support – and the only approach that will enable us to reach our climate goals.

第一步是要认识到没有银弹。 我们再也不能忽视CCS，或谈论一个解决方案与另一个解决方案; 目标必须是消除二氧化碳。 我们需要能源效率。 我们需要可再生能源。 我们需要CCS。 现在是时候采用全方位的清洁能源方法 - 一个政府和私营部门一致支持 - 以及使我们能够实现气候目标的唯一方法。