全球变化知识资源中心

Policymakers are divided over how best to decarbonize the global energy system. Many studies focus on what we know about current technologies' ability to meet emissions reduction targets. But understanding the impact of future uncertainties around governance, business models, economics, and public attitudes is equally important.

Such uncertainties perpetuate debates about the best policies to transform countries' energy systems. In an article in Energy Policy, Jim Watson and colleagues¹ suggest that more time and better data is unlikely to resolve these conflicts, and that decisions must inevitably be based on imperfect knowledge.

They map 14 significant sources of uncertainty, and set out potential actions to mitigate such conditions. In doing so, they give a good impression of the complexity decision-makers face when designing energy policy.

A major debate in the UK's parliament prior to the last election was whether the Conservative-led government would loosen the country's mid-term emissions reduction target, known as the fourth carbon budget. Watson and colleagues carry out an assessment of the feasibility of the budget (covering the years 2023 to 2027), and the implications that sticking to it could have for policymakers and other stakeholders.

Eight instrumental factors that introduce uncertainty into decision-making are highlighted: the availability of finance for low-carbon power generation, commercialization of low-carbon power generation technologies, diversity of heat decarbonization pathways, heat pump performance, district heating investment and business models, energy efficiency improvements and demand reduction, diversity of transport decarbonization pathways, and adoption of electric vehicles. They also identify six systemic uncertainties: fossil fuel availability and price, bioenergy availability and price, material scarcity, ecosystem service impacts, public attitudes to energy system change, and political commitment to a low-carbon transition.

They point out the unexpectedness of change, showing that actual developments often lie outside the range of imagined futures. So, how helpful is this in terms of meeting the fourth carbon budget?

Decision-makers need to understand the complexities of available climate and energy policy choices. The main contribution of Watson and colleagues is to identify a useful framework to assess this.

They set out some basic rules for making decisions in a time of uncertainty: policymakers need to set about 'opening up' the process to get the public involved and connected, need flexibility and diversity of options within energy policy, need to learn from best practice, and need to set about ensuring their country, region or locality uses as little energy as possible.

But while they give a good overview of energy policy uncertainties and what the most rational processes are to deal with this situation, they do not reference cases where rapid change has already occurred. If they had done this, they might have concluded that some decision-making variables are more important than others when trying to reduce emissions.

Watson and colleagues show most energy policy choices can be made to seem uncertain. But what they fail to illuminate is that a technology pathway way to meet the UK's carbon targets will require a very different energy system with different practices. Different technologies will be necessary, but markets, business models, system operation and customer involvement will also have to change. Each of these has the potential to alter the system in different ways. Such uncertainty leads to contradictory information flowing from stakeholders anxious that their preferred pathway is chosen.

Policymakers' energy choices depend on the governance of each specific country. This in turn depends on the very practical realities of governance and policy design, such as laws, technical realities, economic incentives, and social and cultural preferences. These are known as the 'enabling environment', which makes doing something possible and economic. The third important factor is someone or something taking action. How these three things come together is less well understood.

Moreover, uncertainty is a double-edged sword. For any country that does not really want to implement an effective energy or climate policy, uncertainty can always be a reason to undertake more research. As the article concludes “efforts to overcome uncertainties have resulted in complex solutions or a tendency to inertia or inaction”. On the other hand, if a country wants to put policies in place to meet a carbon budget or any other goal, 'uncertainty' about the future does not stop it from doing so.

Apart from the technical and design aspects of policy effectiveness, what stops a policy from working is, ultimately, public connection and reaction. Andy Stirling has likened this to 'murmurations' or 'emancipatory transformations'². When a concept such as reducing emissions becomes more about enabling unruly collective action than responsible policy, Stirling argues, change can happen very rapidly.

XiXinXing / iSTOCK / THINKSTOCK

1. Watson, J., Gross, R., Ketsopoulou I & Winskel, M. Energy Policy http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2015.02.030 (2015).
2. Stirling, A. Alternative Energy Pathways — Making Democractic Choices (SPRU & STEP Centre, University of Sussex, 2014); http://go.nature.com/OQrUKK
3. Randall, T. Fossil fuels just lost the race against renewables. Bloomberg (14 April 2015); http://go.nature.com/Xt5j7q
4. Renewables 2014 Global Status Report: 2014 Key Findings (REN21, 2014); http://go.nature.com/ctYC8z
5. Solar Photovoltatics Deployment (Department of Energy and Climate Change, 2014); http://go.nature.com/8RYnfb
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7. The Danish Energy Model:Innovative, Efficient and Sustainable (Danish Energy Agency, 2015); http://go.nature.com/4KQ1P3
8. Burger, C. Germany's Decentralised Energy Revolution (European School of Management and Technology, , 2014); http://go.nature.com/iHFsur
9. Mitchell, C. The Political Economy of Sustainable Energy (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).

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