“Green Innovation – Providing Energy AND Safeguarding the Environment”
Summary of Key Talks
Look forward on a long term time scale.
Shell Energy Scenarios: demographic changes and demand, national changes, technology developments. This is available on the web. Developed two main scenarios – Scramble and Blueprint.
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The Scramble Scenario - focus on energy supply, bilateral deals, local energy resources coal and bio-fuels. The pressure on the environment will increase
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The Blueprints Scenario – focus on supply + environment, coalitions will be built, energy will be a universal resource available from the most convenient resources, fewer consequences for the climate and the environment.
Shell can’t determine what scenario will rule, as a company they prefer the second one
The two scenarios define different energy mixes – less energy altogether in the second one, less coal usage. Shell thinks that unless they do something more creative the situation will not be sustainable.
Options for change – new technologies, are interested in those that reduce CO2 emission. Even if they have the technology today – the change will take time, sometimes 25-50 years… the technologies we have today will define what will be in the next 25 years.
Example – Gas to Liquid conversion (GTL)- started in 1970, built a pilot plant in 1983, world’s first commercial plant in 1993, Qatar – the first world-scale plant in 2008 (the Pearl GTL Project). Require international agreements…
The three Cs – for an energy source to be accepted today it needs to be Cheap, Convenient and Clean.
Renewable – some are here today – bio-fuels, wind energy, hydrogen, solar. They are still challenged by the economics around them.
For each energy source have a detailed roadmap. For bio-fuels one of the major challenges is sustainability – meaning that the energy source CANNOT be competing with food. In this area they collaborate openly with universities and others…. There are too many options so they want to narrow down to those options that have the best commercial outlook.
They don’t think that the world is running out of oil – there are enough oil molecules in the world… the problem is that these molecules are more difficult to get to and they product more CO2. Also work on a clean coal technology – believe that it is possible to do already have some solutions.
They also develop unconventional resources like the Gas to Liquid, and Oil sense which nature didn’t yet have the time to convert it to liquid – and Shell wants to accelerate the process. The solution - they put heat in the ground – but how to do that without generating more CO2? They have some of these technologies already….
Technology by itself is not enough – 6 CO2 reduction pathways: increasing the efficiency of the operations, continuing to develop new ways, work with governments, and establish sustainability capabilities….
Industry alone can’t do it – need government and consumers/people as well.
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