Land use impacts of low-carbon energy system transition – the case of UK bioenergy deployment under the Carbon Plan

Abstract:

The UK Department of Energy and Climate Change has developed four low-carbon energy transition pathways - the Carbon Plan - towards achieving the legally binding 80% territorial greenhouse gas emissions reduction, stipulated in the 2008 Climate Change Act by 2050. All the pathways require increase in bioenergy deployment, of which a significant amount could be indigenously sourced from crops. But will increased domestic production of energy crops conflict with other land use and ecosystem priorities?

To address this question, a coupled analysis of the four energy transition pathways and land use has been developed using an integrated resource accounting platform called Foreseer^TM. The two systems are connected by the bioenergy component, and are projected forward in time to 2050, under different scenarios of energy crop composition and yield, and accounting for various constraints on land use for agriculture and ecosystem services.

The results show between 7 and 61% of UK agricultural land could be required to meet bioenergy deployment projections under different combinations of crop yield and compositions for the transition pathways. This could result in competition for land for food production and other socio-economic and ecological land uses. Consequently, the potential role of bioenergy in achieving UK emissions reduction targets may face significant deployment challenges.