Page 103 - Çevre Şehir İklim İngilizce - Sayı 2

Burcu Hiçyılmaz - Sedat Alataş - Etem Karakaya

taken into account. The recent IPCC report emphasizes these differences and
suggests that many current options in all sectors provide great potential for
mitigating net emissions by 2030. In terms of their potential contribution to the
net-zero emissions target, there is great emphasis on wind and solar energy,
public transport, fuel-efficiency and light electric cars for the transport sector,
and efficient lighting equipment for the residential sector. The options for the
industry sector include energy efficiency, material efficiency and substitution,
fuel switching (electricity, hydrogen, etc.), carbon capture and utility (CCU)
and carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies, and the mitigation of
non-CO2 emissions (IPCC, 2022b).
All these policies and technologies mentioned above can significantly
contribute to the reduction of emissions to a large extent (IPCC, 2022b).
However, the potential size of this contribution, how long it will take effect,
and how much it will cost are also extremely important. For example, CCU and
CCS technologies are considered important technologies to tackle climate
change. However, their potential to meet the mitigation expectations is still
being discussed (Katelhön et al, 2019). Thus, they have not been applied
successfully at a large scale except for a few pilot applications (Akerboom
et al, 2021), considered cost-effective (Wennersten et al, 2015; Mac Dowell
et al, 2017). Similarly, green hydrogen technology also provides important
opportunities for phasing out fossil fuels, but it also brings its own limitations
(van Renssen, 2020).
The technological solutions discussed for decarbonization in the industry
are not only costly but also largely not in the application stage. Therefore,
improving resource efficiency has been applied for a long time. Moreover, it
provides advantages in costs. To illustrate, increasing energy efficiency has
been at the center of the mitigation of industrial emissions for a long time. In
fact, it can also be claimed that countries have been successful in this issue.
However, the recently issued IEA report reveals that the energy-efficiency
performance of countries is well below the level needed to achieve global
climate and sustainability goals. It also suggests that global developments in
energy efficiency have been declining since 2015 (IEA, 2020a).
The main determinant of industrial emissions is the direct or process
emissions and chemical processes associated with the burning of fossil fuels in
various sub-sectors (Baumert et al, 2005; Fransen et al, 2021). For this reason,
the factors that render industrial emissions intensive and “hard-to-abate”
might also play an important role in the mitigation options. In this regard,
the recent academic studies (Alwood et al, 2011; Aidt et al, 2017; Bataille,
2020; Alataş et al, 2021b; Karakaya et al, 2021) and reports by international

89 Journal of Environment, Urbanization and Climate