Analysis by Beacon Economics
Highlight
- With the most aggressive adoption model, per-ton emissions of cement can reach below 30 percent of business-as-usual by 2035 - the industry overall saving approximately 6.9 million metric tons of CO2e in that year. That amount is equivalent to taking over one and a half million gas vehicles off the road (about 10% of all Californian passenger vehicles), 870,000 homes’ annual energy use, or shutting down 1.9 coal power plants for a year. However, those major emissions savings only emerge about a decade into the future, even under this most rapid model of adoption. There are no projected savings of over 20 percent of base-case emissions before 2030, even in the rapid model. The moderate adoption model projects a 35 percent saving on emissions over the business-as-usual model, with approximately 3.4 million metric tons of CO2e saved. This amount equivalent to 760,000 gas vehicles’ annual emissions, or 430,000 homes’ annual energy usage.
Opportunity
- The sum of savings from 2023 to 2035 over the business-as-usual case is also significant. Under the rapid adoption model, California stands to avoid almost 29.5 million metric tons of CO2e emissions, an amount equivalent greater than the annual emissions of Denmark, 6.5 million passenger vehicles’ annual emissions, the annual energy usage of 3.7 million homes, or the amount of carbon sequestered by 35 million acres of forest in a year (an area equivalent to a third of California). The moderate adoption model sees 11 million metric tons of carbon emissions foregone, equivalent to the emissions of 3 coal power plants in a year, two and a half million passenger vehicles, or 1.4 million homes. As a percentage, the rapid model represents a 24 percent reduction in emissions over the 13-year period, and the moderate case only a 9 percent saving compared to the business-as-usual scenario. This is due primarily to emissions being slow to drop as adoption is limited before 2030; the 2031-2035 five-year sums see a saving of 50 percent for rapid adoption and 20 percent for moderate adoption over the base case scenario.
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Decarbonizing Concrete
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