Scenario perspectives

If the global temperature rise is to be limited to 2°C compared with the pre-industrial temperature level, global greenhouse gas emissions will have to be reduced by 50-85 per cent from the current levels by 2050, according to the IPCC. Furthermore, the industrial countries will have to cut their emissions by 80-95% by 2050 and by 25-40% by 2020 to achieve this warming limit. The European Union has announced its readiness to cut emissions by 30 per cent from the 1990 level by 2020 if other industrialised countries also proceed with corresponding reductions. The EU has unilaterally undertaken a commitment to reduce emissions by 20 per cent by 2020, and has also proposed indicatively to cut its emissions by 60-80 per cent by 2050. In Finland, greenhouse gas emissions can be reduced by 60-66% from 1990 to 2050 according to the scenario study presented in this article, if the emission rights price rises no higher than 80 euro /tCO2-eq. Increased energy efficiency becomes an important factor in emission reductions. The most important energy production technologies which reduce emissions are bioenergy technologies, wind power and nuclear power. There will be a strong decrease of greenhouse gas emissions in the sectors of condensing-based electricity production, district heating, and separate heating. Most of the emission reduction will take place in ETS rather than the non-ETS sector. It is very likely that the global and European emission reduction policies will also cause a rapid development of the markets for new energy technologies, which will create opportunities also for Finnish R&D and manufacturing companies.