First paragraph: Heated debates and controversies surrounding the regulation of medical residents' work hours have raged for over twenty years. In the wake of Libby Zion's untimely death in 1984 and resulting recommendations by the Bell Commission, New York State enacted legislation (Code 405.4) governing residents' working conditions and supervision [1]. Since then, there has been growing interest in regulating residents' work hours, culminating recently (2003–2004) in national guidelines and legislation on duty-hour restrictions both in the United States and Europe [2,3].
This report synthesizes the findings for the energy sector of a broader study, the Brazil low carbon study, which was undertaken by the World Bank in its initiative to support Brazil's integrated effort towards reducing national and global emissions of greenhouse gases while promoting long term development. The main aim of the study is to examine the potential for abating Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions in Brazil in the energy area and to assess the relative costs of doing so for the time frame 2010-2030. Basically the study seeks to demonstrate by how much, by when and at what cost Brazil could reduce its GHG energy sector emissions. Given its special features, the fuel use and emissions of greenhouse gases in the transportation sector are dealt with in another report of this project. In addition the study aims to provide information for the Brazilian government to enable it to develop a long-term strategy (2030) for reducing carbon in the energy area (except the transport sector) and, more specifically, to provide the technical input needed for evaluating the potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions produced by the key economic sectors. In short, the study seeks to identify the different options and opportunities that could justify possible international resources being allocated to Brazil. The teams involved in the study needed first to focus on the proposed mitigation and carbon sequestering options and then, after identifying these proposals, to focus on existing barriers to the successful deployment of these options and suggest a set of public policies which could be mobilized to overcome them. The study also provides estimates of the scale of investments and operating costs likely to be involved, as well as a mitigation cost curve.
Solar energy is the second most applied variable renewable source worldwide, after the wind. In 2014, its world installed capacity was around 177 GW. During the past years, the yearly new capacity of photovoltaic (PV) solar yearly new capacity has exceeded new wind projects, highlighting this new solar power trend. This study aims to estimate technical and economic potential of the solar PV in the Colombian residential sector taking into account characteristics such as socio-economic stratum, household electric power consumption, tariffs by utility and capital cost. Technical-economic simulation tools were integrated into a geographical information system ('GIS') to permit a spatial analysis. Results shows solar generation potential and its annual penetration potential for all socioeconomic strata within all Colombian municipalities up to 2030. The current technical potential is around 9.1 GWp (13.10 TWh/year), while the economic potential will be 3.2 GWp by 2030. ; The authors would like to express their gratitude to the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cientifico e Tecnológico (National Scientific and Technological Development Council – CNPQ), Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior ((Brazilian Federal Agency for the Improvement of Higher Education-CAPES) and NETEP - European-Brazilian Network on Energy Planning, a project supported by a Marie Curie International Research Staff Exchange Scheme Fellowship within the 7th European Union Framework Programme (PIRSES-GA-2013-612263), for the essential support given for this work to be carried ...
This work seeks to evaluate overnight construction costs (OCC) and lead-time escalation of nuclear power construction projects from 1955 to 2016. To this end, a comprehensive database of commercial Light Water Reactors (LWR) was developed and a statistical analysis was conducted. Findings reveal a significant delay in lead-time, especially for the last generation reactors constructed from 2010s, with 3/4 of the sample showing significant construction delays. This results in an escalation of capital costs rather than in a decline. Average OCC of newer reactors is 60% higher than the ones implemented in the earlier stages of the nuclear era. This suggests a discontinuity of the learning curve for both OCC and lead-time, which threats the market and financial sustainability of current and future nuclear energy projects. Although this is a general trend, this discontinuity is country specific and, thus, induced by national policies and regulatory frameworks. Therefore, the role of nuclear technology as an alternative to cope with the need for a decarbonisation of the power sector must be better evaluated, taking into account the real cost impacts of nuclear technology implementation. ; - This work was funded by the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development agency (CNPq) (166074/2015-2) and the Marie Curie International Research Staff Exchange Scheme Fellowship within the 7th European Union Framework Programme, under the project NETEP- European Brazilian Network on Energy Planning (PIRSES-GA-2013-612263). Authors would like to acknowledge Rafael Garaffa for his helpful advices about processing data with R statistical software and data analysis. Authors are also thankful to the comments of anonymous reviewers. Special thanks to the Grantham Institute and Imperial College London media office for assisting in publicising the findings of the ...
This study estimated a series of indicators to assess the energy security of supply and global and local environmental impacts under different mitigation scenarios through 2050 in Brazil, designed with the integrated optimisation energy system model MESSAGE-BRAZIL. The assessment of interactions between environmental impacts and energy security dimensions was complemented through the application of life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology. Overall results imply energy security establishes more synergies than trade-offs in increasingly stringent mitigation scenarios, especially patent within the sustainability dimension, which increases energy security and provides additional benefits regarding climate change mitigation and air pollution emissions. It is still necessary to extend analysis to other energy sectors in addition to the power supply sector, to promote a better understanding of repercussions of energy scenario expansion in energy security. ; This work was funded by the Brazilian research funding agencies CNPq and CAPES, under the Science Without Borders Programme, and the Marie Curie International Research Staff Exchange Scheme Fellowship within the 7th European Union Framework Programme, under the project NETEP- European Brazilian Network on Energy Planning (PIRSES-GA-2013-612263). We also acknowledge funding from US EPA and US AID (under Interagency Agreements DW89923040 and DW89923951US), through the LAMP, and the European Union, through the CLIMACAP project ...
Carbon capture and Geological storage (CCGS) is recognised as a technology capable of reducing large-scale emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), which is an important part of the portfolio of alternatives necessary to achieve significant reductions in the global emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG). As of this context where greenhouses gases constrains in Europe would come, and CCGS would be a mitigation option for GHG, it becomes necessary to develop a CO2 transport network to collect and inject it in a proper geological reservoir. Therefore, the following methodology can help to implement a pipeline network in any region in the world by doing a preliminary analysis about the best places to locate a HUB (temporary CO2 reservoir). In this paper, the demonstration of the methodology refers to Portugal's industrial emission sources in which CCS could be implemented. ; This research was supported by a Marie Curie International Research Staff Exchange Scheme Fellowship within the 7th European Union Framework Programme, under project NETEP- European Brazilian Network on Energy Planning ...
Carbon capture and geological storage (CCS) is a key technology for the World deep decarbonization. However, several challenges remain, such as the optimization of the carbon transportation infrastructures. This study proposes a methodology that applies the Kernel Density function in a geographic information system software and uses as input, CO2 emission sources data to identify emission clusters and emission high-density hotspots. The main goal of the proposed methodology is to perform a preliminary screening to identify areas of interest to install hubs when designing an optimized CO2 pipeline network. The methodology includes an estimation of capturable CO2 emissions and a density analysis that was based on Kernel Density function from the ArcGIS Desktop 10. The methodology was applied to the Iberian Peninsula CO2 industrial emission sources such as refineries, coal and natural gas power plants and cement factories (case study) and the results showed that in Portugal, CO2 industrial emissions reduction can reach up to 68% and, in Spain, up to 74% of CO2 industrial emissions, could be avoided. These are called capturable CO2 emissions which means that they are the portion of the total emissions that can be captured from industrial processes before they reach the atmosphere. Moreover, hubs were shown to be more viable when Portugal and Spain are considered together, therefore, carbon routes (pipeline network) in the future may consider an integrated route for the Iberian Peninsula. ; - Thanks to Professor Fernando Gomes Martins from the University of Porto. He supported and encouraged this work under the project NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000005 - LEPABE-2-ECO-INNOVATION, supported by North Portugal Regional Operational Programme (NORTE 2020), under the Portugal 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).This research was supported, also, by a Marie Curie International Research Staff Exchange Scheme Fellowship within the 7th European Union Framework Programme, under project ...
This work seeks to evaluate overnight construction costs (OCC) and lead time escalation of nuclear reactors from 1955 to 2016. To this end, a comprehensive database of commercial Light Water Reactors (LWR) was developed and a statistical analysis was conducted. Findings reveal that there is significant delay in lead time, especially for the last generation reactors constructed from 2010's. This results in the escalation of capital costs rather than a decline. Average OCC of newer reactors are 60% higher than the ones implemented in the earlier stages of the nuclear era. This suggests a negative learning curve effect for both OCC and lead time, which threats the market and financial sustainability of current and future nuclear energy projects. Although this is a general trend, this negative effect is country specific and, thus, induced by national policies and regulatory frameworks. Therefore, the role of nuclear technology to cope with the decarbonisation of the power sector must be better evaluated, taking into account the real cost impacts of nuclear technology implementation. ; This work was also funded by the Brazilian research funding agency CNPq. ; This work was funded by the Brazilian research funding agency CNPq and the Marie Curie International Research Staff Exchange Scheme Fellowship within the 7th European Union Framework Programme, under the project NETEP- European Brazilian Network on Energy Planning ...
In exchange for political support, the Brazilian government is signalling landholders to increase deforestation, putting the country's contribution to the Paris Agreement at risk1. The President of Brazil has signed provisionary acts and decrees lowering environmental licensing requirements, suspending the ratification of indigenous lands, reducing the size of protected areas and facilitating land grabbers to obtain the deeds of illegally deforested areas2. This could undermine the success of Brazil's CO2 emission reductions through control of deforestation in the previous decade. Integrated assessment models are tools to assess progress in fulfilling global efforts to curb climate change3,4. Using integrated assessment models developed for Brazil, we explore 2 °C-compliant CO2 emission scenarios estimating the effort needed in other sectors of the economy to compensate for the weakening of environmental governance, potentially resulting in higher deforestation emissions. We found that the risk of reversals of recent trends in deforestation governance could impose a burden on other sectors that would need to deploy not yet mature technologies to compensate for higher emissions from land-use change. The abandonment of deforestation control policies and the political support for predatory agricultural practices make it impossible to meet targets consistent with Brazil's contribution to a 2 °C world.
Emissions pathways after COVID-19 will be shaped by how governments' economic responses translate into infrastructure expansion, energy use, investment planning and societal changes. As a response to the COVID-19 crisis, most governments worldwide launched recovery packages aiming to boost their economies, support employment and enhance their competitiveness. Climate action is pledged to be embedded in most of these packages, but with sharp differences across countries. This paper provides novel evidence on the energy system and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions implications of post-COVID-19 recovery packages by assessing the gap between pledged recovery packages and the actual investment needs of the energy transition to reach the Paris Agreement goals. Using two well-established Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) and analysing various scenarios combining recovery packages and climate policies, we conclude that currently planned recovery from COVID-19 is not enough to enhance societal responses to climate urgency and that it should be significantly upscaled and prolonged to ensure compatibility with the Paris Agreement goals.
