The coming years will be crucial in dealing with climate emergencies, emphasizes panel on energy transition, during RCGI event
Our present decade is crucial for dealing with the worldwide climate emergency and the trouble spots are more geopolitical than technological in nature in the opinion of participants in a panel on energy transition during the annual conference of the Centre for Research and Innovation on Greenhouse Gases (RCGI), on October 25, in São Paulo.
“The issue is much more political, that is, geopolitical, than technological,” stated researcher Paulo Arturo, Professor of the Physics Institute of the University of São Paulo (USP) and lead author of a chapter of the most recent report of the Intergovernmental panel on Climate Change (IPCC). “The war in Ukraine totally changed the energy question and, furthermore, there are new far-right governments in several countries, like Italy, Sweden, and others, that hold a new political perspective that will affect everything, including the results of COP27 (27th Conference of the United Nations on Climate Change), held in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt.”
According to the researcher, science already has the technology needed to measure the global greenhouse gas emissions up to 2030. The technological challenge will occur afterwards, in terms of diminishing them even further than that. “We do not have much time. That is, we have merely this decade to change. If we do not change by 2030, we will probably will wave good-bye to everything we are talking about here,” he stressed.
The Vice President of Technology Engineering of the Anglo-Dutch company Shell, Ajay Mehta, who also took part in the panel, agreed. “This is an unsustainable situation. If we do not act in the next five, seven, or ten years, it will be game over. We all have a role to play.” Shell partners with the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) and the Centre for Research and Innovation on Greenhouse Gases (RCGI), headquartered in USP. With investments of R$ 63 million, the RCGI seeks to make Brazilian science an international point of support for the strategies of public and private sectors involved in combatting climate change.
According to Artaxo, in geopolitical terms, the world is facing a much more complicated moment now than that of last year’s COP, because the tension between the United States, China, and Russia has increased, as well as the tension throughout the world between the developed and developing nations. Brazil, however, in his opinion, has a strategic advantage in being able to cut 44% of its emissions quickly and cheaply, by simply avoiding burn-offs and deforestation in the Amazon. “Furthermore, no other country has such an immense wind and solar energy potential. Brazil needs to exploit this strategic, in order to minimize the problems related to its vulnerability (to climate change).”
The participants emphasized the importance of maintaining the forests and the natural areas for absorbing carbon dioxide, as well as reforestation. “São Paulo is living proof that it is possible to reconcile the growth of production with reforestation of deteriorated areas,” informed the General and Scientific Director of the RCGI, Julio Meneghini.
Shell’s General Director of R&D and Innovation, Oliver Wanbersie, stated that one of the challenges faced within the environment of private companies is to think seriously about the immensely competitive efforts between companies and the need to protect innovations, like patents, for example. “We must rethink what we should or should not share, in light of the urgency surrounding climate change, in order to work together and more quickly. There is a need for more collaboration and flexibility. And we need to produce more energy, but with a much smaller footprint.”
The panelists believe that we will see decades of tension related to climate crises, but that it is not an impossible mission, despite the turbulence, of battling global warming. They stressed that there is no silver bullet. “I agree that biofuels will not be the only solution, and should be a small part of it,” Meneghini. “However, it is possible to join this with the production of hydrogen, as we will be doing on a small scale with financing from Shell, and unite it with the production of sustainable aviation fuel.” Hydrogen is seen by many as a strategic fuel for the future, since it does not emit pollutants when it is used.
Experts also mentioned that there are still very few incentives offered for carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects. “Why are there only 40 CCS projects, worldwide? Why is there no project like this in Brazil? It is still expensive,” said Ajay Mehta. The capture, storage and use of the carbon from greenhouse gases are seen as tools for mitigating climate change. one project that is under development by the RCGI provides for storage in ocean-floor salt caves of the gas extracted along with petroleum in offshore wells, which is considered to be refuse and is usually released at the petroleum platforms.
The panel on energy transition met at USP’s International Diffusion Center during the first annual Energy Transition Research & Innovation (ETRI 2022) conference held after the covid-19 emergency. More information on the event can be read at this link.
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About the RCGI – The Research Centre for Innovation in Greenhouse Gases (RCGI) is an Engineering Research Centre created in 2015, with funding by FAPESP and Shell. The research of the RCGI is focused on innovations that make it possible for Brazil to achieve the commitments assumed in the Paris Agreement, within the scope of the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC). The full 19 research projects are anchored within five programs: Nature-Based Solutions (NBS); Carbon Capture and Utilization (CCU); Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS); Greenhouse Gases (GHG); and Advocacy. The Centre currently has about 400 researchers. Learn more here.
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