Research Integrated Assessments

Project: Incorporating Carbon Capture and Storage Technologies in Integrated Assessment Models

Research Team: James McFarland, Howard Herzog and Henry Jacoby

Sponsor: Carbon Sequestration Initiative and DOE Office of Science

Year: 2006

Abstract:
Low-carbon emitting technologies are a key component of technical change in integrated assessment models. We develop a methodology for incorporating technologies into computable general equilibrium economic models and demonstrate this methodology by implementing carbon capture and storage technologies in the MIT Emissions Prediction and Policy Analysis (EPPA) model. Three primary implementation issues are discussed: characterization of the technical system, translation of bottom–up engineering information into an economic model, and the depiction of realistic technology adoption rates. The specification of input substitution, relative costs, and plant dispatch are the most critical factors in technology representation. Technology adoption rates in economic models are governed by exogenous and endogenous constraints. A comparison of the current approaches used in economic models with the theoretical and empirical factors affecting adoption rates highlights opportunities for refining the current methods.

Publications:
McFarland, J.R.and H.J. Herzog, "Incorporating Carbon Capture and Storage Technologies in Integrated Assessment Models," Energy Economics, Vol 28: pp 632-52 (2006). <PDF>

McFarland, J.R., H.J. Herzog and H. Jacoby, "The Future of Coal Consumption in a Carbon Constrained World," Proceedings of 7th International Conference on Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies (GHGT-7), Vancouver, Canada, E.S. Rubin, D.W. Keith and C.F. Gilboy (eds.), Elsevier, pp 1563-1568, September (2005). <PDF>

McFarland, J.R., J.M. Reilly, and H.J. Herzog, "Representing Energy Technologies in Top-down Economic Models using Bottom-up Information," Energy Economics, Vol 26, Issue 4, pp 685-707 (2004). <PDF>

McFarland, J.R. and H.J. Herzog, "Incorporating Carbon Capture and Storage Technologies in Integrated Assessment Models," presented at the EMF Workshop on Climatic Change Impacts and Integrated Assessments, Snowmass, Colorado, July 28-August 7 (2003). <PDF>

McFarland, J.R., H.J. Herzog, and J.M. Reilly, "Economic Modeling of the Global Adoption of Carbon Capture and Sequestration Technologies," Proceedings of 6th International Conference on Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies (GHGT-6), Volume II, J. Gale and Y. Kaya (Eds.), Elsevier, pp 1083-1088, (2003). <PDF>

McFarland, J., H. Herzog, J. Reilly, and H. Jacoby, "Economic Modeling of Carbon Capture and Sequestration Technologies," presented at the First National Conference on Carbon Sequestration, Washington, DC, May 14-17 (2001). <PDF>