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Marginal abatement cost curves for NOx incorporating both controls and alternative measures
Citation:
Loughlin, Dan, K. Kaufman, B. Keaveny, AND Alex Macpherson. Marginal abatement cost curves for NOx incorporating both controls and alternative measures. To be Presented at CMAS Conference, Chapel Hill, NC, October 05 - 07, 2015.
Impact/Purpose:
This poster (and underlying work) demonstrate that the approximations of marginal abatement cost curves used in regulatory impact assessments (RIAs) may be conservative since they do not typically consider non-end-of-pipe controls. For a case study, we show that these controls may shift the marginal abatement cost curve to the right by 50-100%, indicating that considerable additional control may be achievable at the same marginal cost per ton. This is an important finding in the context of RIAs.
Description:
A marginal abatement cost curve (MACC) traces out the efficient marginal abatement cost level for any aggregate emissions target when a least cost approach is implemented. In order for it to represent the efficient MAC level, all abatement opportunities across all sectors and locations must be included in the curve. However, in the context of air quality management, MACCs typically are approximated by sorting well-characterized end-of-pipe controls by their respective cost effectiveness. Alternative measures, such as renewable electricity, energy efficiency, and fuel switching (RE/EE/FS), are not considered as it is difficult to quantify their abatement potential. As such, existing approximations of MACCs may be biased high.We demonstrate the use of an energy system model to develop national and sectoral MACCs for nitrogen oxides (NOx) that incorporate both end-of-pipe controls and these alternative measures. The resulting MACCs may be incorporated into other modeling tools, such as Integrated Assessment Models, and may be of use in developing emission control strategies.