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Abstract:
The European Green Deal aims to guide the European Union towards achieving
net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by implementing a comprehensive set of
policy initiatives and legislation. While emission reduction targets and policies
up to 2030 are mostly implemented, it is of high priority for EU legislation to
spell out the further transformation to climate neutrality by defining interim
policy targets for 2040. To provide information for this target-setting process,
we use an integrated energy-economy-climate model with high sector detail to
explore pathways to achieve climate neutrality in the EU under uncertainty
about key energy system developments. Results suggest that emission
reductions of 86% (sensitivity range: 80% to 93%) by 2040 relative to 1990 are
consistent with a cost-efficient distribution of mitigation efforts over time,
substantially exceeding the 78%-level implied by a linear interpolation between
the 2030 and 2050 targets. Additionally, we identify a 7-fold (sensitivity range:
4–8-fold) upscaling of electricity generation from wind and solar, a 49%
(sensitivity range: 45–59%) share of electricity in final energy supply and an
upscaling of carbon capture and storage (CCS) to 188 Mt CO2/yr (sensitivity
range: 56–257) as crucial transformation milestones for 2040.
