Time and tide wait for no man: pioneers and laggards in the deployment of CCS

Abstract

In Europe the ambitions of individual countries to deploy carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies are diverse. Reasons for this are, amongst other things, the heterogeneity of national electricity generation systems and storage capacities and the differences in the public perception of these technologies. In this analysis we investigate the consequences of partial deployment of CCS, i.e. we consider a situation where some European countries (the “pioneers”) actively deploy CCS technologies, while others (the “laggards”) do not use CCS. Our study focuses on the question whether it pays throughout to be a pioneer and whether laggards will generally be disadvantaged. In our assessment, we take into account impacts on consumers affected from rising electricity prices, electricity suppliers whose profits are influenced by changes in both electricity prices and sales, and international trade-flow changes (modifications in European electricity import/export patterns).