E4tech (2012) Bioenergy Technology Innovation Needs Assessment (TINA). Commissioned by Carbon Trust, as part of a series of studies carried out by the Low Carbon Innovation Group. All results are provisional at the moment. Due to be reviewed and then published late 2011/early 2012.
How do you find this source?
Please contact Ben Murphy or Jason Eis at Carbon Trust
What is the general approach that this source takes to estimating costs?
TINAs are a collaborative effort of the Low Carbon Innovation Co-ordination Group (LCICG), which is the coordination vehicle for the UK’s major public sector backed funding and delivery bodies in the area of low carbon innovation. Its core members are the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI), the Technology Strategy Board, and the Carbon Trust. TINAs aim to identify and value the key innovation needs of specific low carbon technology families to inform the prioritisation of public sector investment in low carbon innovation. Beyond innovation there are other barriers and opportunities in planning, the supply chain, related infrastructure and finance. These are not explicitly considered in the TINA’s conclusion, since they are the focus of other Government initiatives (in particular those from the Office of Renewable Energy Deployment in DECC and from BIS).
This document summarises the Bioenergy TINA analysis and draws on a much more detailed TINA analysis packs which will be published separately. TINAs are one part of a broader LCICG work programme which aims to:
- Share strategy insights and develop a common understanding of the priority needs for each technology in terms of energy system impact and commercial opportunities for UK companies;
- Co-ordinate plans, to achieve more by working collectively: to ensure that the intent of one member is not frustrated by lack of action by another and to seize opportunities presented by each other’s successes.
The TINAs apply a consistent approach across a diverse range of technologies, and a comparison of relative values across the different TINAs is as important as the examination of absolute values within each TINA. The TINA analytical framework was developed and implemented by the Carbon Trust with contributions from all core LCICG members, as well as input from numerous other expert individuals and organisations.
For each of the bioenergy technologies assessed in the TINA, the following information was gathered and synthesised:
- Overview of technology area and innovation potential: mapping supply chain steps, and their status of development
- Value in meeting emissions and other energy policy targets at lowest cost: baseline, expected and stretch improvements in each supply chain step (e.g. efficiencies, cost reduction) combined with UK deployment scenarios, leading to cost savings for the UK
- Value in business creation: An assessment of UK strengths vs. other countries gives a captured share of the global market value, based on global deployment scenarios
- Market barriers and case for public sector activity: identification of key obstacles in supply, demand, policy and infrastructure, and whether public sector intervention is required (or can the UK rely on other countries to develop solutions first?)
- Opportunities for public sector activity: summary of highest value areas that match UK strengths - and what needs to be done to overcome the barriers to realising this potential
What are the limitations of this source?
Disclaimer – the TINAs provide an independent analysis of innovation needs and a comparison between technologies. The TINAs’ scenarios and associated values provide a framework to inform that analysis and those comparisons. The values are not predictions or targets and are not intended to describe or replace the published policies of any LCICG members. Any statements in the TINA do not necessarily represent the policies of LCICG members or the UK Government.
In many cases, the deployment scenario data from ETI ESME or CCC MARKAL is not at a high enough resolution to be able to distinguish individual bioenergy technologies, and hence splits have had to be made based on likely global deployments, or a set of assumptions. For example, "imported biofuels" will contain 1G ethanol, 1G biodiesel, 1G butanol, HVO, FT diesel, upgraded pyrolysis oil, novel sugar routes, bioDME, lignocellulosic ethanol and lignocellulosic butanol (amongst others). Similarly, "UK biomass" will contain forestry, agricultural residues, energy crops and wastes.
The deployments are exogenous inputs from other models (ETI ESME, CCC MARKAL, IEA Blue Map), therefore technology cost reductions do not lead to higher UK or global deployments - i.e. there are no cost/deployment iterations. The cost reductions in each component are often based on backcasting learning rates to match up with estimated future data points (e.g. current and 2050 costs are known, but the trajectory inbetween is assumed to depend on the global deployment). Related to this, one final difficulty of the TINA approach is that if a technology achieves very high cost reductions, then the savings to the UK energy system are high, however, the market value is low (because the deployments do not increase). Alternatively, if a technology remains expensive, its market value remains high (because the deployments do not decrease).