Energy and Society
Week 4: Energy for “the Global South”
Section Notes
Agenda
1. Energy Transitions and Development (30 minutes)
2. Biomass, Households, and Gender (20 minutes)
I.
ENERGY TRANSITIONS AND DEVELOPMENT
1. IPAT equation
The IPAT equation describes environmental impact as the product of three factors:
Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology
a. Please describe energy consumption and carbon emissions using IPAT equation.
Energy Consumption = Population * GDP per capita * Energy Intensity [GJ/$]
Carbon Emissions = Population * GDP per capita * Carbon Intensity [Gt-C/$]
b. Unlike developed countries, developing countries have submitted carbon emission reduction
targets to the UN for “Paris Protocol” (tentative name) this year in the form of “carbon
intensity” (carbon emission per GDP). Explain the rationale and problems about this type of
emission reduction target.
Rationale: Population and GDP per capita are often considered as the major sources of economic growth of
developing countries, and setting total carbon emission target may lead to constraining their economic growth.
Developing countries insist that they have the right of economic growth and fulfill their responsibility to address
climate change by decoupling economic growth and carbon emissions.
Problems: If the rate of increase in population and GDP per capita offset the effect of the decrease in carbon
intensity, total carbon emissions increase. Considering carbon emissions from developing countries (non-OECD
countries) is more than that from developed countries (OECD countries), global carbon emissions may also
increase even though developed countries decrease their carbon emissions.
2. Development Metric
GDP per capita is often used as a development metric.
a. What is the difference between GNP and GDP?
“Gross national product (GNP) is the market value of all the products and services produced in one year by labor
and property supplied by the citizens of a country. Unlike Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which defines
production based on the geographical location of production, GNP allocates production based on location of
ownership. When a country's capital or labour resources are employed outside its borders, or when a foreign firm is
operating in its territory, GDP and GNP can produce different measures of total output. In 2009 for instance,
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the United States estimated its GDP at $14.119 trillion, and its GNP at $14.265 trillion.” [Source:
Wikipedia]
b. What is the main flaw of GDP per capita as the development metric?
Open end question. Main flaw is neglecting the environmental impact (resource depletion, pollution, waste disposal,
etc) and societal impact (income inequality, crime, etc)ie the negative externalities
c. What kind of information can you gain from the Lorenz Curve and Gini Coefficient?
The Lorenz Curve and Gini Coefficient summarize income distribution within a country.
The Lorenz curve represents the share of wealth held by each percentile of society as shown in the Figure 1 below.
The smaller A is, the more equitable distribution.
Gini Coefficient = A/(A+B). If the Gini Coefficient is 0 (A=0), income distribution is completely equal. If the
Gini Coefficient is 1, income distribution is completely unequal.
E.g. US: 0.411, China: 0.421, Germany: 0.306, Mexico: 0.472, Norway: 0.268, Zambia: 0.575 (in 2010,
source: World Bank)
Figure1. Lorenz Curve
d. Based on this week’s reading, what other measures for development can you cite?
Human Development Index (HDI), used in World Bank’s Human Development Report, is an index measuring
life expectancy (health) and education, in addition to income (GDP). The details of computing the index can be
found on Wikipedia about HDI and World Bank’s HDI webpage. This is mentioned in the Goldemberg
reading.
e. What are some strengths and weakness of using an “index” at all? What about other factors
such as environment, happiness? What factors should we include?
Open-end question. It is difficult to perfectly quantify the wellbeing of a nation’s resident. For example, how do
you assign a specific weightage for income, in comparison with education, health, environment, etc. This weightage
may well vary by individuals.
3. Energy consumption and Development
a. According to the BP statistical review of world energy, the global primary energy
consumption is about 13btoe in 2014. Roughly speaking,
1. How many percent of the global primary energy consumption do developing
(non-OECD) countries account for? Which one of the following numbers is
true?
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a. 37%
b. 45%
c. 52%
d. 57%
The answer is c. Energy consumption in developing countries is 7.4btoe and has nearly
doubled from 2000 to 2014.
2.
How many percent of the growth of the global primary energy consumption
are developing countries projected to account for from 2013 to 2035?Which
one of the following numbers is true?
a. 70%
b. 82%
c. 92%
d. 96%
The answer is d. The world primary global energy consumption increase 37% during the
time, and developing countries account for 96% of the increase.
3.
What is the largest source of the global primary energy consumption in 2014?
Oil (4.2btoe), followed by coal (3.9btoe) and natural gas (3.1btoe). These fossil fuels account
for over 85% of the primary energy consumption.
b. The graphs in Figure2 examine the relationship between energy use and various indicators
such as life expectancy rate, literacy, etc.
1. Where does the slope of the curves dramatically change?
About 2MWh/year (~0.2toe).
2. How do you interpret the change in correlation between energy consumption
per capita and human development indicator at a certain threshold?
Open end question. We see clear association between these variables. There is diminishing
effect of increasing energy use on the indicators.
The steeper slope for the first 2 MWh per capita per annum highlights the role of energy
access in improving life quality, which is of particular relevance to poor countries.
3.
You are a senior energy advisor to the Prime Minister of a Sub-Saharan
African country, whose energy consumption per capita per annum is way
below 2MWh/year. Using these graphs, what do you recommend on energy
policy of the country? Why?
Open end question. Many studies show that human development indicators greatly improve
with the increase in energy consumption per capita up to 2MWh/year (~0.2toe) per capita.
Considering thatbasic energy services need to be fulfilled for everybody (e.g. Bare-Bones
Budget is 0.6MWh/year per capita), the country should improve energy efficiency and energy
access for poor people.
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Figure2. Human development and energy consumption per capita
II.
BIOMASS, HOUSEHOLDS, AND GENDER
1. Traditional biomass is a major primary energy source for cooking and heating in developing
countries.
1. What are the major problems about using traditional biomass for cooking and
heating? Why are cook stoves so important?
the traditional use of biomass has severe adverse health impact (e.g. particulate emissions such as
PM2.5 and CO) and poor efficiency of energy conversion. Unfortunately, because women’s time is
often undervalued and women tend to stay inside house, they are exposed more health risk than
men and use much time in collecting woods for cooking and heating.
Efficient cookstove burns the biomass more completely, reducing the release of CO, high
concentration of which could pose a health risk.
2.
Suppose you are planning aproject to disseminate energy-efficient LED with small
solar PV system in rural India as a member of an international NGO. What
factors influence adoption of small-scale energy technologies by poor? What
lessons can you learn from the past cook stove dissemination projects?
Based on the past cook stove experience, the important factors include:
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- Upfront capital cost and operation & management cost such as fuel cost.
- Ease of use and repair (technology should be built and repaired locally)
- Cultural acceptability (e.g. do the tortillas still taste good?)
- Compatibility with existing infrastructure (e.g. kitchen and cook ware)
The lessons include:
- It is not enough for the technology to perform well in a technical sense. It must also fulfill
economic, social, and cultural requirements.
- It is necessary to consider the above-mentioned factors when planning the project. For that
end, the users should be involved in every step of technology development. Different preferences
prevail in different countries. You can’t transplant a standard technology and expect it to
succeed.
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