“Turn your lights off – it costs money.” Those were the words of my parents, which still resonate with me to this day.
So began my lesson in the value of electricity. Literally, with every flick of a light switch or appliance button, I think about the cost. By virtue of the career that I’ve had, I understand two important things about the power market:
From outset, let me be clear. I believe in coal and clean coal technologies, and I believe in renewables. I also understand the strengths and limitations of both.
So that’s why, when we talk energy transition technologies, we must always assess risk – but risk based on reality. Risk based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). And risk based on technologies that are both technically and commercially feasible within the timelines proposed to reach net-zero emissions.
If you are reading this, you are likely to be familiar with coal’s worth. You are also likely to be wondering why that “worth” is currently challenged on one metric alone - coal power’s contribution to global CO2 emissions. How are other economic, environmental and social costs being factored into national decisions regarding the transition to a net zero emissions future? Are they all being considered equally?
This subject is critical to the World Coal Association (WCA) as the peak body representing the global coal industry. When we talk of the global coal industry, we should be clear; we mean the global coal value chain, including producers, consumers, suppliers, financiers and investors.
The WCA has pivoted to this holistic viewpoint because what has become abundantly clear, throughout the global public climate debate, is that we are all considered as connected and undifferentiated. We are one brand – “Brand Coal” - and our brand is generally disliked, distrusted and disrespected.
I regularly ask myself how and why we have failed, as a coal value chain, to promote the coal industry in any way for its clean technologies. After all, coal provides the building blocks of modern society, especially across regions such as Southeast Asia. It remains a base product in the manufacture of steel, cement, aluminium, lime - even renewables. And it’s pertinent to note that, for every 1 MW of wind capacity, around 103 tonnes of stainless steel and 20 tonnes of cast iron is required. In turn, according to the IEA Clean Coal Centre, in order to produce the required iron and steel, close to 80 tonnes of coking coal needs to be used in production.1
This surely begs the question: do we sufficiently value and verbalise coal’s critical role in addressing energy poverty and energy security? And, does “Brand Coal” advocate loudly enough for the real decarbonised solutions which exist today, and legitimise it to be part of the clean energy transition, with the appropriate government and investment policies in place?
No, and no again. There is not a day that goes by without coal being mentioned in the context of either being phased out, starved of investment or criticised because one or other developing country is still building coal capacity. The just-launched International Energy Agency (IEA) Net Zero by 2050 report2, is a culmination of the current global green rhetoric.
In my view, we – Brand Coal, as the coal value chain - need to do two things:
How do we do this? We start a new conversation based on facts.
Coal remains an affordable, reliable source of power to billions of people. The recent IEA Outlook shows coal to still be the largest single source of electricity at 22% in 20403. As a commodity, it is intrinsic to electricity supply in more than 80 countries - up from 66 in 20004.
Globally, an estimated 785 million5 people still lack access to electricity which means limited or no access to heat, light, fuel and other essential services which we all take for granted as a basic human right.
Coal remains a reliable baseload for dispatchable energy towards universal access. However, it also acts as a support for intermittent renewable energy; in fact, the two are co-dependent and must coexist. Without adequate battery storage, renewables will still require reliable intermittent power on sunless, windless days. And infrastructure such as wind turbines will still need to be built using those coal building blocks mentioned earlier – expressly, steel and concrete.
Clean coal technologies are proven and available in various forms. Leading the way are High Efficiency Low Emissions (HELE) and Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), both of which can be perfectly applied to eliminating CO2 emissions from coal. If HELE technology was deployed across the current world coal fleet, we could cut 2 Gt (gigatons) from annual carbon emissions6 -the equivalent of eliminating the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region’s entire energy-related carbon emissions7 for 2019. We do not advocate that all coal plants should be equipped with these clean technologies; parts of the coal fleet are ageing and approaching decommissioning, so it is rarely commercially feasible to retrofit them. However, there is still a new, young coal fleet which would benefit from clean technology deployment; the only obstacles stopping this are opaque or absent government policies, which provide no investment certainty. This limits opportunities to deploy at scale and thereby drives technology costs down.
Pollution Control Technology A combination of electrostatic precipitators, fabric filters, selective catalytic reduction systems, wet and dry scrubbers, solvents, and activated carbon injection remove pollutants before they are emitted into the atmosphere. These can reduce emissions by between 90-99.9%, including oxides of sulphur and nitrogen (SOx and NOx), and particulate and trace elements, such as mercury. This technology exists and the issue now is the application of ‘off-the-shelf’ technology. Coal to Biomas Co-Combusion Also known as Biomass co-firing, this process adds biomass renewable organic materials such as wood pellets as a partial substitute fuel in high efficiency coal boilers. Coal and biomass are co-combusted in boilers that have been designed to burn coal. Co-firing is an option to convert biomass to electricity, in an efficient and clean way, and to reduce GHG emissions of the power plant.
High Efficiency Low Emissions Technology (HELE) HELE technology works on coal-fired power plants by producing more electricity using less coal by harnessing new generation technology and materials. HELE plants operate at higher temperatures and air pressure to more rapidly convert water to steam. Hundreds of new high efficiency low emissions (HELE) coal-fired plants are in operation, under construction or planned in South, Southeast and East Asia (led by China and India).
Coal Gasification Coal gasification is the process of converting coal into gas by adding steam and oxygen under pressure. The coal is fed into a high-temperature pressurized container along with steam and a limited amount of oxygen to produce a gas. The gas is known as synthesis gas or syngas and mainly consists of carbon monoxide and hydrogen. The gas is cooled and undesirable components, such as carbon dioxide and sulphur, are removed.
Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) IGCC systems combine a coal gasification unit with a gas fired combined cycle power generation unit. The first stage is the coal gasification process as mentioned above. The second stage takes the cleaned gas and burns it in a conventional gas turbine to produce electrical energy. The hot exhaust gas is recovered and used to boil water, creating steam for a steam turbine which also produces electricity.
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) CCS captures the CO2 produced by coal combustion, compresses it for transportation and then injects it deep into a rock formation at a carefully selected and safe site, where it is permanently stored. Alternatively, the CO2 can be used in industrial applications, such as to increase pressures in oil reservoirs in a process known as enhanced oil recovery (EOR). The development of near zero emission technologies has commenced and is accelerating rapidly.
Coal to Hydrogen is proving itself to be a particularly impressive decarbonisation mechanism, which allows the creation of a fuel which supports the decarbonisation of the transport industry. Hydrogen supply to industry is now a major business; the IEA reports that hydrogen demand has experienced a threefold increase since 1975, almost entirely supplied by fossil fuels (6% natural gas and 2% of global coal to hydrogen)8. Incidentally, coal to hydrogen remains more cost-effective than green hydrogen (hydrogen fuel created from renewable energy alone)9.
There are some good examples of Coal to Hydrogen in application already. The joint Japanese/Australian Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain (HESC) in Victoria is producing hydrogen from brown coal in the State of Victoria and exporting it to Japan. Four more Coal to Hydrogen plants are planned in Australia alone, while the Great Plains Synfuel Plant in North Dakota, United States, which commenced operations in 2000, is already producing approximately 1,300 tonnes of hydrogen per day in the form of hydrogen rich syngas from brown coal gasification with CCS10.
The Paris Agreement called for an inclusive, energy-agnostic approach to meeting climate change objectives. Many countries participated on this basis and chose coal and clean coal technologies in good faith as part of their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) as their commitment along a net-zero pathway.
Countries which chose coal did so to support sustainable development through the deployment of affordable, reliable coal-fired power which helps countries industrialise, urbanise and create vital infrastructure and amenities for modern life.
Clean coal technologies will be fundamental to achieving a net zero-emissions future; in fact, without them Paris is lost. As the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has noted, realising the Paris Agreement would be 138% more expensive11 - therefore simply unachievable - without CCS.
The evidence is clear: the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement will require the widescale deployment of CCS across a diversity of applications, including electricity generation, industrial applications and bioenergy. Modelling by major independent bodies, including the IEA and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) for a net-zero future, are predicated on CCS application.
In the Report 20 Years of Carbon Capture and Storage12, the IEA states: “Following the ratification of the Paris Agreement, the ability of CCS to reduce emissions from fossil fuel use in power generation and industrial processes – including from existing facilities – will be crucial to limiting future temperature increases to "well below 2°C" - as laid out in the Agreement13.
CCS technology will also be needed to deliver "negative emissions" in the second half of the century if these ambitious goals are to be achieved. This tells us that the conversation we are in needs to evolve.
Recently, President Biden acknowledged that the technological developments which have generated wider use of wind and solar power has helped make them strongly competitive against coal and natural gas in the United States. This comment is pertinent to world coal now, since the energy industry often sees us as being in competition with renewables.
Just to be clear - we are not. We believe all energy sources need to be considered not only on their own merit but also in an equal and agnostic way which does not play favourites. Renewables have certainly benefitted from various support and policy instruments which have speeded up their deployment, but evidently they cannot make the clean energy transition on their own.
What the Paris Agreement does not intend is that low emissions should equate to low growth. The COVID-19 pandemic brought the world to a standstill and resulted in overall emissions reductions during 2020. But in April this year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) announced that due to the post COVID-19 economic recovery, global CO2 emissions will surge by 1.5 billion tonnes in 2021 - the second-largest increase in history and the largest annual increase in emissions since 2010, during the global financial crisis infrastructure recovery14. This effectively reverses any emissions gains made during the worst effects of the COVID-19 pandemic last year.
So many may ask, if all this is true, how did coal end up in this predicament? Simply, we got distracted - all of us. We took our eye off the solution. And the solution lies in technology diversity. All fuels and all technologies need to be on the table; global power markets are varied, with some mature in terms of energy growth while many are not.
According to the IEA: “Policy makers need to make sure market conditions are well adapted for reaching such ambitious goals. The recent successes of solar PV, wind, batteries and electric vehicles have shown that policy and technology innovation have the power to build global clean energy industries”15. They were talking about Hydrogen – but I think this is true for any new technology. Those policy makers are not just in governments; they also come from the finance, investment and the insurance sectors.
I recently met with a financier of a battery minerals play who asked me which sectors and clean technologies I would invest in. My response was this: “If the pandemic taught me anything, it was the importance of security to people. Not just physical security but security of food, water, health and energy. So, I would opt for a diversified energy mix and clean technologies, with an emphasis on health and agriculture. And that picture will look different for each region.”
I stand by this because it is simply unrealistic to think there is a “one size fits all” approach to the clean energy transition. At the end of the day, the most critical factor for the sustainability of any energy system is the cost of running a reliable and affordable system. This is one takeaway from the IEA Net Zero by 2050 report which should be underscored.
There are many pathways to get to Net Zero by 2050, of which the IEA scenario is one; however, it is not the only one. Good environmental intentions are not enough; if the future cost of energy rises, and by “cost” I include a lack of reliability (not just price), then questions will be asked. The question is: will it be too late for those who didn’t put their eggs in the diversification basket?
For many years, policy makers and generators used the Levelised Cost of Electricity (LCOE) metric to understand the costs associated with generation technologies. The LCOE metric is under increasing scrutiny however, as it does not provide a complete measure of competitiveness.
To respond to the growing role played by intermittent renewable generation, the IEA recently introduced the VALCOE (value-adjusted levelised cost of electricity) as a new cost measure to compare dispatchable generation technologies with variable generation technologies. VALCOE builds on the LCOE metric by including three additional considerations of value in power systems, including energy, capacity and flexibility.
The VALCOE metric is increasingly considered as the preferred model to compare different generation sources, as it represents a more comprehensive measure of competitiveness than LCOE alone. It also provides a crucially important means of comparing available technologies for longer-term national and regional energy development planning.
For the purposes of comparing energy generation, a lower VALCOE represents a lower cost to the system. Figure 1 on the previous page shows the VALCOE costs for various generation options in Singapore and the Philippines; Coal and Hydro are notable as the lowest cost options.
The cost adjustment for various generation options requires an estimate of the energy revenues of different technologies and required wholesale electricity prices. The Philippines and Singapore, the region’s only two markets using wholesale electricity prices, have been selected as case studies.
Current (2018) VALCOE costs for both renewable and thermal energy-generating technologies suggest that hydroelectric power and solar PV are currently competitive against coal. In both the Singapore and Philippine markets, coal and hydro are amongst the lowest cost options.
Hydroelectric power generation is the most cost effective in Singapore with the lowest cost, followed by subcritical coal and supercritical coal. Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) is the costliest technology in Singapore, with the highest VALCOE cost, followed by nuclear. A similar pattern of VALCOE costs is presented by the Philippines, though the positions of hydroelectric and subcritical coal are reversed, with the latter being the least costly by 1$/MWh.
While hydropower energy may compete with coal on a cost basis, it has limited deployment potential beyond certain jurisdictions, thereby limiting its credibility as a baseload source of electricity. More advanced coal technologies have a slightly higher VALCOE compared to subcritical coal, due to the initial higher capital costs. Removing this initial construction component, the operating costs are largely determined by fuel costs, so more efficient, cleaner plants that burn less coal will have lower operating costs. Moreover, cleaner coal plants tend to have a lower fixed cost, due to higher levels of automation and less maintenance.
Today, coal-fuelled power is the least costly way for thermal capacity expansion in the ASEAN region from the perspective of total system cost.
If the World Coal Association has one job to do now, it is to persuade governments, industry and investors to coalesce and collaborate around the need to support all fuel sources and all clean technologies. This was the intention of the Paris Agreement, and it should not be forgotten.
We are pursuing this goal by engaging with stakeholders across the whole of coal value chain. An example of this is the three-year Memorandum of Understanding we signed in December last year with the Jakarta-based ASEAN Centre for Energy (ACE) within the ASEAN region - the economic union of 10 member countries in Southeast Asia.
This partnership is producing a wealth of joint studies based on the UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Action Agenda. It is aimed at informing policy decisions in the ASEAN region and speeding the way for faster and wider clean coal deployment. It demonstrates how committed the WCA and ASEAN Centre are in enabling economic growth and decarbonisation across the ASEAN region. We understand that there are also other coal markets which will value similar support.
Getting the right balance between economic, social and environmental objectives remains top-of-mind and remains a priority focus, as developed countries look to developing countries to pull their climate weight.
The WCA maintains that ASEAN countries have every right to access affordable sources of clean energy so they can build their societies and economies; similarly, they have every right to choose any energy source that makes sense for them. And for many countries, coal is the energy source that makes most sense.
We are eager to ensure that investors and governments do not disadvantage those countries which choose to use coal. We believe our work, like that of the ASEAN Centre for Energy, can help educate governments, investors and other key stakeholders about why coal remains an option and how it can “come clean” through the deployment of clean technologies. It hinges on cooperation and collaboration between all parties, in the spirit of Paris, and asks for an equitable consideration around the decision-making table.
There are several compelling reasons why ASEAN governments have identified coal as the fuel of choice to power their continued development.
Reliability Delivering reliable electricity depends on stable uninterrupted generation sourced from fossil and/or nuclear sources. The rapidly urbanising and industrialising economies of Southeast Asia require the development of stable on-grid electricity now and into the future, such as delivered by coal.
To illustrate, in 2015 Vietnam’s hydropower generation was significantly impacted by El Nino. At the same time, the phenomenon drove domestic power consumption to record levels, as citizens turned to air conditioning to combat the heat wave. At El Nino’s height in the first few months of 2015, power consumption rose by more than 10%, with the share of coal-fired output rising to more than a third of overall generation.
[ Reference - Reuters (2015) Buyers beware: Vietnam coal exports grapple with El Nino year, Available at: https://www.reuters.com/article/vietnam-energy-coal/buyers-beware-vietnam-coal-exports-grapple-with-el-nino-year-idUKL3N0Z13PM20150616?edition-redirect=uk (Accessed: 21/4/2021). ]
Services to the grid As highlighted by Vietnam’s experience, the ASEAN region is vulnerable to extreme weather events; flexibility is critical to a secure energy system. When facing disruptive events, generators must respond by rapidly increasing electricity supply, decreasing demand, or a combination of both. Modern flexible coal plants can ramp power up and down as needed to meet demand; they also provide essential grid-stabilising services, such as inertia and frequency and voltage control. Such capabilities will be particularly important for meeting the rising electricity demands from both the electrification of transport and industry.
Access The ASEAN region has made the greatest strides in delivering universal electricity access across the Asia-Pacific subregion, with only about 10% remaining without access. In recent years, renewable energy has proven particularly adept at providing off-grid electricity for remote communities in the least developed economies. The challenge going forward will be to delivering modern energy services that satisfy the needs of the growing consumer class. There is a huge opportunity to ensure that the modern and clean coal technologies can play a role to ‘ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all’.
Since the Paris Agreement, campaigners in some quarters have argued that coal has no place in the future energy mix. Southeast Asia’s transition toward HELE technologies demonstrates how environmental imperatives with the legitimate aims of energy security and economic development, including poverty alleviation.
In 2014, subcritical technologies represented more than 90% of installed capacity and 70% of coal capacity additions for the year. According to the IEA Clean Coal Centre, around 43% of planned or under construction coal-fired plants after 2015 in Indonesia were either supercritical or ultra-supercritical, a significant increase from 12% in 2010-2014. [Reference IEA Clean Coal Centre, Hele perspectives for selected Asian Countries, 2018, pg 32. Available here https://www.iea-coal.org/report/hele-perspectives-selected-asian-countries/ ]
Without international financial, technological, policy and other kinds of support to accelerate deployment of HELE technology, the ASEAN’s transition away from subcritical technologies will stall, weakening the recent gains in reducing energy intensity and carbon emissions. Third party analysis has indicated that depending on certain modelling assumptions, phasing out financial support for coal plants may restrict economic growth in the short- and medium-term by 0.1–0. 5%. [Reference - Paul Baruya, IEA Clean Coal Centre (2020) The Economic and Strategic Value of Coal , 2020: IEA Clean Coal Centre p.27Available here https://www.iea-coal.org/report/report-the-economic-and-strategic-value-of-coal-paul-baruya/]
Investment in HELE technologies can reduce emissions by up to 0.5 billion tons of CO2 in the ASEAN. Modelling suggests around 234 GW of new coal capacity to be required in ASEAN through 2040 to meet growing energy demand.
With a modest increase to this planned capital expenditure, generators could ensure all planned coal plants commit to use ultra-supercritical technology. Finance partners have the opportunity influence the type of technology that developers select resulting in significantly lower emissions for a global benefit.
Our analysis indicates an additional investment of 6.2% (US$ 8.7 billion) would be required to incentivise all coal combustion capacity to be built using ultra-supercritical technology (Figure 2 on the previous page). With such investment, it is projected that ultra-supercritical technology could stand to reducing CO2 emissions by 500 million tonnes cumulatively by 2040 (approximately 25 million tonnes of CO2 per year), compared to a ‘business as usual’ scenario (Figure 2 on the previous page).
It is evident that the current focus on “phasing out” coal is not working to reduce emissions; in fact, if we adopt the IEA’s most recent pathway to eliminate all fossil fuel development, a total annual energy investment of US$5 trillion would be required by 2030. This would add an extra 0.4 percentage point a year to annual global gross domestic production (GDP) growth, and place global GDP 4% higher in 2030 than it would be based on current trends16. It would also require installing the equivalent of installing the world’s current largest solar park roughly every day to reach the 630 GW of Solar PV by 203017.
Recently, during my attendance of the St Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), I noted the acknowledgement from colleagues that there is great ambition around net zero, but a lack of holistic and realistic thinking. Our net zero systems will need to be clean, reliable and affordable - no one is prepared to suffer delay or disruptions. This will require the wisdom and cooperation of policy makers and all industries’ courageous actions, making the transformation that is right - not popular.
Ultimately, the IEA report represents a potential pathway - not “the” pathway. So the WCA has instigated a more realistic and pragmatic discussion about the “phase in” of new technologies across every pathway. The one thing we can all agree on, from the IEA to teenage activists, is that more must be done by everyone.
Brand Coal is ready to do what it can through the deployment of clean coal technologies. The Association has adopted a five-year Evolving Coal Strategy focused on educating the global community about the critical role that coal plays. Over the coming months, the World Coal Association will be engaging with key constituencies to create a better sense of awareness about coal’s transition and contribution to a clean, green economy.
It is happening - but not fast enough. You are invited to join us on this journey; we encourage all involvement so that sensible, sustainable decisions are made. There’s been a lot of pie in the sky thinking thrown at the climate change debate - we would like to bring it back to earth.
To that end, we will be calling for government support, private investment and policy settings which allow coal to be treated equally and agnostically alongside its stable mates. The sooner that all parties – coal, renewables, gas - realise that this is a collaborative exercise, the better.
We are not getting to Paris unless we cross the line together. That does not mean continued use of old technologies that don’t address climate change; we need clean technologies and a better understanding about the whole of value “worth” of coal. Because it is still worth a lot.
Michelle Manook is CEO, World Coal Association. mmanook@worldcoal.org
1 IEA Clean Coal Centre (2020) Coking Coal - The Strategic Raw Material, London: IEA Clean Coal Centre p.91 Available at https://www.iea-coal.org/report/coking-coal-the-strategic-raw-material/ 2 IEA (2021), Net Zero by 2050, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050 3 IEA (2020), World Energy Outlook 2020, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/world-energy-outlook-2020 , p.384 4 Mary Hutzler (2021) China’s Economic Recovery Will Be Powered by Coal, Available at: https://www.powermag.com/chinas-economic-recovery-will-be-powered-by-coal/#:~:text=China%20is%20one%20of%2080,than%20any%20other%20generating%20fuel. (Accessed: 23 May 2021). 5 IEA (2021), Net Zero by 2050, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050 , p.17. Full report available: https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/4719e321-6d3d-41a2-bd6b-461ad2f850a8/NetZeroby2050-ARoadmapfortheGlobalEnergySector.pdf 6 IEA Clean Coal Centre (2021 ) A Technology Roadmap for HELE Coal Plant, London: IEA Clean Coal Centre .p.34, https://www.iea-coal.org/report/a-technology-roadmap-for-high-efficiency-low-emissions-coal-power-plant-ccc309/
7 Based on author estimations informed by International Energy Agency (2019) Southeast Asia Energy Outlook 2019, Paris: IEA/OECD.p100 available her https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/47552310-d697-498c-b112-d987f36abf34/Southeast_Asia_Energy_Outlook_2019.pdf 8 IEA (2019), The Future of Hydrogen, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/the-future-of-hydrogen 9 HYDROGEN PRODUCTION FROM COAL, 14 April 2021, Greg Kelsall, IEA Clean Coal Centre Webinar, available at https://www.iea-coal.org/webinar/hydrogen-production-from-coal/ 10 https://www.globalccsinstitute.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Global-CCS-Institute_Response-to-the-National-Hydrogen-Strategy-Issues-Papers_July-2019-002.pdf , p.2. 11 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2014), Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change. Contribution of Working Group III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Geneva: World Meteorological Organization - https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg3/
12 IEA (2016), 20 years of carbon capture and storage, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/20-years-of-carbon-capture-and-storage , p.115, available at - https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/24c3d26b-aa44-4b54-b9c0-5201d4d86a04/20YearsofCarbonCaptureandStorage_WEB.pdf 13 IEA (2016), 20 years of carbon capture and storage, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/20-years-of-carbon-capture-and-storage , p.115, available at - https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/24c3d26b-aa44-4b54-b9c0-5201d4d86a04/20YearsofCarbonCaptureandStorage_WEB.pdf 14 IEA (2021), Global Energy Review 2021, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/global-energy-review-2021 - as per media statement: https://www.iea.org/news/global-carbon-dioxide-emissions-are-set-for-their-second-biggest-increase-in-history 15 IEA News, June 2019, International action can scale up hydrogen to make it a key part of a clean and secure energy future, according to new IEA report, https://www.iea.org/news/international-action-can-scale-up-hydrogen-to-make-it-a-key-part-of-a-clean-and-secure-energy-future-according-to-new-iea-report
16 IEA Net Zero by 2050, p.22 - https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/4719e321-6d3d-41a2-bd6b-461ad2f850a8/NetZeroby2050-ARoadmapfortheGlobalEnergySector.pdf 17 IEA Net Zero by 2050 analysis: https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050
