Applying the open-source climate, land, energy, and water systems (CLEWs) model to Canada

oleh: Kamaria Kuling, Trevor Barnes, Abhishek Shivakumar, Maarten Brinkerink, Taco Niet

Format: Article
Diterbitkan: Elsevier 2022-11-01

Deskripsi

In this paper the Climate, Land, Energy, and Water system (CLEWs) interactions of biofuels production are addressed. We utilize an open-source modelling framework to assess direct and indirect impacts of biofuels on long-term electricity generation, land, and water use. We analyse a switchgrass biofuels pathway and find that while the land use implications are substantial, increasing by 646,190 km 2 in agricultural land area, the impacts on water systems, which increases by approximately 222 billion m 3 compared to the baseline, may be even more limiting for the Canadian context. While switchgrass biofuels can contribute low-carbon dispatchable electricity, the land and water use impacts suggest that any biofuels should be used for hard to decarbonize sectors prior to using them for electricity.