Dynamic linking of upstream energy and freight demands for bio and fossil energy pathways in the Global Change Analysis Model

Jon Sampedro, Page Kyle, Christopher W. Ramig, Daniel Tanner, Jonathan E. Huster and Marshall A. Wise

Applied Energy, 2021, vol. 302, issue C, No S0306261921009569

Abstract: Comprehensive study of the environmental impacts associated with demand for an energy resource or carrier in any one sector requires a full consideration of the direct and indirect impacts on the rest of the regional and global energy system. Biofuels are especially complex since they have feedbacks to both the energy system and to regional and global crop markets. In this study, we present a strategy for dynamically including the upstream energy and transportation links to the Global Change Analysis Model. We incorporate the following inter-sectoral linkages: energy inputs to crop production, energy inputs to fossil resource production, and freight transport requirements of energy and agricultural commodities. We assess the implications of explicitly including these links by measuring the global impacts of increased corn ethanol demand in the United States with and without these links included. Although the net global impact of the upstream links on energy and emissions are relatively modest in the scenarios analyzed, the inclusion of these links illustrates interesting trade-offs in energy and transportation demand among fossil fuel and agriculture sectors. We find that the increment in agricultural energy driven by the additional biofuel production associated with the corn ethanol shock is higher than the decrease of energy associated with the displaced fossil fuel consumption. However, this effect is compensated by the reduction in freight transportation requirements of energy. These sectoral interactions suggest that this level of modeling detail could be important in evaluating future analytical questions.

Keywords: Upstream energy; Integrated assessment; Fossil fuels; Bioenergy; Environmental impacts (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261921009569
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:appene:v:302:y:2021:i:c:s0306261921009569

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 405891/bibliographic

DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2021.117580

Access Statistics for this article

Applied Energy is currently edited by J. Yan

More articles in Applied Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().