More than energy savings: quantifying the multiple impacts of energy efficiency in Europe

Panel: 8. Monitoring and evaluation: building confidence and enhancing practices

This is a peer-reviewed paper.

Authors:
Johannes Thema, Wuppertal Institut for Climate Environment and Energy, Germany
Felix Suerkemper, Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy, Germany
Stefan Thomas, Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy, Germany
Diana Ürge-Vorsatz, Advanced Buildings and Urban Design, Hungary
Jens Teubler, Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy
Johan Couder, University of Antwerp
Souran Chatterjee, Centre for Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Policy, Central European University
Stefan Bouzarovski, School of Environment, Education and Development, University of Manchester
Nora Mzavanadze, School of Environment, Education and Development, University of Manchester
David von Below, Copenhagen Economics

Abstract

Energy efficiency improvements have numerous benefits/impacts additional to energy and greenhouse gas sav-ings, as has been shown and analysed e.g. in the 2014 IEA Report on „Multiple Benefits of Energy Efficiency“. This paper presents the Horizon 2020-project COMBI ("Calculating and Operationalising the Multiple Benefits of Energy Efficiency in Europe"), aiming at calculating the energy and non-energy impacts that a realisation of the EU energy efficiency potential would have in 2030. The project covers the most relevant technical energy efficiency improvement actions and estimates impacts of reduced air pollution (and its effects on human health, eco-systems/crops, buildings), improved social welfare (incl. disposable income, comfort, health, productivity), saved biotic and abiotic resources, and energy system, energy security, and the macroeconomy (employment, economic growth and public budget). This paper explains how the COMBI energy savings potential in the EU 2030 is being modelled and how multiple impacts are assessed. We outline main challenges with the quantifica-tion (choice of baseline scenario, additionality of savings and impacts, context dependency and distributional issues) as well as with the aggregation of impacts (e.g. interactions and overlaps) and how the project deals with them. As research is still on-going, this paper only gives a first impression of the order of magnitude for addi-tional multiple impacts of energy efficiency improvements may have in Europe, where this is available to date. The paper is intended to stimulate discussion and receive feedback from the academic community on quantifica-tion approaches followed by the project.