Canadian Energy Centre
Reality check: Global emissions from coal plants
A man walks towards a ferry as the Wujing coal-electricity power station is seen across the Huangpu River in the Minhang district of Shanghai. Getty Images photo
From the Canadian Energy Centre
Coal remains the primary fuel for global electricity generation, particularly in Asian countries
High energy prices, inflation, war, and the ongoing economic recovery from the pandemic has highlighted the general worldwide demand for electricity, particularly in Asia and Europe. The growing demand for electricity on these two continents has led some electricity producing plants to rely increasingly heavily on coal as a power source.
The electricity sector accounts for 34 per cent of the world’s energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. In this Fact Sheet, we detail recent trends in electricity production and demand across the globe as well as CO2 emissions from the electricity sector worldwide.
Carbon dioxide emissions from the world’s top ten emitters between 2000 and 2022
A total of 38.2 gigatonnes (Gt) of energy-related CO2 was emitted globally in 2022, an increase of 53 per cent from 2000. However, the increase is not consistent for all countries; between 2000 and 2023, CO2 emissions trends diverged. Emissions from China, India, and Indonesia more than doubled in the last two decades, whereas emissions for other countries remained relatively consistent or even declined.
In 2022, Canada’s total energy-related CO2 emissions were 0.62 Gt, or 1.6 per cent of the global total. That compares to emissions of 0.64 Gt in South Korea, 1.09 Gt in Japan, 2.8 Gt in India, 5.0 Gt in the United States, and 13.0 Gt in China (see Figure 1).
Sources: IEA World Energy Statistics database and Enerdata
Demand for electricity and sources of emissions
Global domestic electricity consumption increased from 13,188 terawatt-hours (TWh) in 2000 to 25,681 TWh in 2022 and estimates are that global demand for electricity will rise to 35,000 TWh by 2040.¹
That is a jump of 94 per cent, or 12,492 TWh, between 2000 and 2022. During the same period, electricity consumption in Asia rose a whopping 280 per cent. In Africa the demand for electricity increased by 90 per cent (see Figure 2). Coal remains the world’s largest source of fuel for electricity generation, with approximately 10,317 terawatt-hours of electricity generated by coal-fired plants in 2022 (see Figure 3).
1. The IEA’s Electricity Market Report 2022 states that nearly all of the increase is attributable to growing electricity consumption in developing countries across southeast Asia and Africa.
Sources: IEA World Energy Statistics database and Enerdata
Sources: IEA World Energy Statistics database and Enerdata
In recent years, electricity generated from the combustion of coal declined in Canada, the United States, Europe, and Africa. However, electricity generated from coal combustion has continued to grow in China, India, and other parts of Asia.
Between 2000 and 2022, the share of coal-powered electricity generation in Asia increased from 49.8 to 56. 3 per cent, while in Canada it decreased from 19.4 per cent to less than 5 per cent.
Sources: IEA World Energy Statistics database and Enerdata
Source of emissions in the electricity sector
The electricity sector accounts for 34 per cent of the carbon dioxide emitted across the world. The sector emitted 13.05 gigatonnes of CO2 in 2022, an increase of 5.01 Gt from 2000. In Asia, between 2000 and 2022, CO2 emissions from the electricity sector increased from 2.5 Gt to 8.3 Gt and the sector’s share of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions increased from just over 32 per cent to well over 40 per cent (see Figure 5).
Sources: IEA World Energy Statistics database and Enerdata
Coal burned to generate electricity accounts for the majority of the CO2 emitted in power generation. In 2022, coal-fired electricity\ generation accounted for 9.89 Gt, or nearly 76 per cent of the worldwide CO2 emissions from the electricity sector. The share was even higher in Asia where 92 per cent of emissions from the electricity sector come from coal combustion. Asian coal-fired plants accounted for 7.62 Gt of the total 8.26 Gt of emissions from the sector on that continent (see Figure 6).
Sources: IEA World Energy Statistics database and Enerdata
Conclusion
The global electricity sector, and particularly the sector in Asia, is a major source of CO2 emissions. Relative to Canada’s existing carbon emissions, emissions from the coal-fired power plants worldwide will make any reductions in Canada’s carbon emissions and resulting job losses, higher taxes, and higher costs for consumers and businesses—meaningless.
As 56 per cent of the electricity in Asia is generated by coal-fired plants, a transition from coal- to gas-fired electricity generation in the region could lead to significant reductions in CO2 emissions, reducing emissions by 50 per cent on average. The corollary is that there is a potential market in Asia for natural gas extracted in and exported from Canada. Canada has an opportunity to play a useful and meaningful role in reducing CO2 emissions from the electricity sector by encouraging and contributing to the global natural gas market.
Notes
This CEC Fact Sheet was compiled by Ven Venkatachalam at the Canadian Energy Centre (www.canadianenergycentre.ca). The author and the Canadian Energy Centre would like to thank and acknowledge the assistance of an anonymous reviewer in reviewing the data and research for this Fact Sheet.
References (live as of November 2, 2023)
Canadian Energy Centre (November 7, 2022), Canadian LNG has massive opportunity in Asia: report <https://tinyurl.com/2p9525j6>; Enerdata (2022), Power Plant Tracker database <https://bit.ly/3xfgOdF>; IEA (2022), Electricity Market Report – January 2022 <https://bit.ly/3M0723j> IEA (Undated), World Energy Statistics Database <https://tinyurl.com/ytz789m4>
From the Canadian Energy Centre
“We’re focusing on the opportunity that Canada has, perhaps even the obligation”
It was not a call he wanted to make.
In October 2017, Kevin O’Donnell, then chief financial officer of Nisku, Alta.-based Banister Pipelines, got final word that the $16-billion Energy East pipeline was cancelled.
It was his job to pass the news down the line to reach workers who were already in the field.
“We had a crew that was working along the current TC Energy line that was ready for conversion up in Thunder Bay,” said O’Donnell, who is now executive director of the Mississauga, Ont.-based Pipe Line Contractors Association of Canada (PLCAC).
“I took the call, and they said abandon right now. Button up and abandon right now.
“It was truly surreal. It’s tough to tell your foreman, who then tells their lead hands and then you inform the unions that those three or four or five million man-hours that you expected are not going to come to fruition,” he said.
Workers guide a piece of pipe along the Trans Mountain expansion route. Photograph courtesy Trans Mountain Corporation
“They’ve got to find lesser-paying jobs where they’re not honing their craft in the pipeline sector. You’re not making the money; you’re not getting the health and dental coverage that you were getting before.”
O’Donnell estimates that PLCAC represents about 500,000 workers across Canada through the unions it works with.
With the recent completion of the Trans Mountain expansion and Coastal GasLink pipelines – and no big projects like them coming on the books – many are once again out of a job, he said.
It’s frustrating given that this could be what he called a “golden age” for building major energy infrastructure in Canada.
Together, more than 62,000 people were hired to build the Trans Mountain expansion and Coastal GasLink projects, according to company reports.
O’Donnell is particularly interested in a project like Energy East, which would link oil produced in Alberta to consumers in Eastern and Atlantic Canada, then international markets in the offshore beyond.
“I think Energy East or something similar has to happen for millions of reasons,” he said.
“The world’s demanding it. We’ve got the craft [workers], we’ve got the iron ore and we’ve got the steel. We’re talking about a nation where the workers in every province could benefit. They’re ready to build it.”
The “Golden Weld” marked mechanical completion of construction of the Trans Mountain Expansion Project on April 11, 2024. Photo courtesy Trans Mountain Corporation
That eagerness is shared by the Progressive Contractors Association of Canada (PCA), which represents about 170 construction and maintenance employers across the country.
The PCA’s newly launched “Let’s Get Building” advocacy campaign urges all parties in the Canadian federal election run to focus on getting major projects built.
“We’re focusing on the opportunity that Canada has, perhaps even the obligation,” said PCA chief executive Paul de Jong.
“Most of the companies are quite busy irrespective of the pipeline issue right now. But looking at the long term, there’s predictability and long-term strategy that they see missing.”
Top of mind is Ottawa’s Impact Assessment Act (IAA), he said, the federal law that assesses major national projects like pipelines and highways.
In 2023, the Supreme Court of Canada found that the IAA broke the rules of the Canadian constitution.
Construction of the Coastal GasLink pipeline. Photograph courtesy Coastal GasLink
The court found unconstitutional components including federal overreach into the decision of whether a project requires an impact assessment and whether a project gets final approval to proceed.
Ottawa amended the act in the spring of 2024, but Alberta’s government found the changes didn’t fix the issues and in November launched a new legal challenge against it.
“We’d like to see the next federal administration substantially revisit the Impact Assessment Act,” de Jong said.
“The sooner these nation-building projects get underway, the sooner Canadians reap the rewards through new trading partnerships, good jobs and a more stable economy.”
From the Canadian Energy Centre
By Will Gibson
NeeStaNan project would use port location selected by Canadian government more than 100 years ago
Building a port on Hudson’s Bay to ship natural resources harvested across Western Canada to the world has been a long-held dream of Canadian politicians, starting with Sir Wilfred Laurier.
Since 1931, a small deepwater port has operated at Churchill, Manitoba, primarily shipping grain but more recently expanding handling of critical minerals and fertilizers.
A group of 11 First Nations in Manitoba plans to build an additional industrial terminal nearby at Port Nelson to ship liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Europe and potash to Brazil.
Courtesy NeeStaNan
Robyn Lore, a director with project backer NeeStaNan, which is Cree for “all of us,” said it makes more sense to ship Canadian LNG to Europe from an Arctic port than it does to send Canadian natural gas all the way to the U.S. Gulf Coast to be exported as LNG to the same place – which is happening today.
“There is absolutely a business case for sending our LNG directly to European markets rather than sending our natural gas down to the Gulf Coast and having them liquefy it and ship it over,” Lore said. “It’s in Canada’s interest to do this.”
Over 100 years ago, the Port Nelson location at the south end of Hudson’s Bay on the Nelson River was the first to be considered for a Canadian Arctic port.
In 1912, a Port Nelson project was selected to proceed rather than a port at Churchill, about 280 kilometres north.
The Port Nelson site was earmarked by federal government engineers as the most cost-effective location for a terminal to ship Canadian resources overseas.
Construction started but was marred by building challenges due to violent winter storms that beached supply ships and badly damaged the dredge used to deepen the waters around the port.
By 1918, the project was abandoned.
In the 1920s, Prime Minister William Lyon MacKenzie King chose Churchill as the new location for a port on Hudson’s Bay, where it was built and continues to operate today between late July and early November when it is not iced in.
Lore sees using modern technology at Port Nelson including dredging or extending a floating wharf to overcome the challenges that stopped the project from proceeding more than a century ago.
Port Nelson, Manitoba in 1918. Photo courtesy NeeStaNan
He said natural gas could travel to the terminal through a 1,000-kilometre spur line off TC Energy’s Canadian Mainline by using Manitoba Hydro’s existing right of way.
A second option proposes shipping natural gas through Pembina Pipeline’s Alliance system to Regina, where it could be liquefied and shipped by rail to Port Nelson.
The original rail bed to Port Nelson still exists, and about 150 kilometers of track would have to be laid to reach the proposed site, Lore said.
“Our vision is for a rail line that can handle 150-car trains with loads of 120 tonnes per car running at 80 kilometers per hour. That’s doable on the line from Amery to Port Nelson. It makes the economics work for shippers,” said Lore.
Port Nelson could be used around the year because saltwater ice is easier to break through using modern icebreakers than freshwater ice that impacts Churchill between November and May.
Lore, however, is quick to quell the notion NeeStaNan is competing against the existing port.
“We want our project to proceed on its merits and collaborate with other ports for greater efficiency,” he said.
“It makes sense for Manitoba, and it makes sense for Canada, even more than it did for Laurier more than 100 years ago.”
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