This paper examines the implications of imposing an 80% reduction of EU CO₂ emissions on the Union’s energy system by 2050 compared to 1990 levels. The study also attempts to project the most cost-effective transformation pathway to achieve this goal using the recently developed European TIMES Model (ETM-UCL), a technology-rich, bottom-up linear optimization model.

The report is structured as follows: In Chapter 3 the TIMES model is described in brief. Chapter 4 provides a discussion of the scenarios and assumptions applied in the model. Three scenarios are presented: a reference scenario that provides a basis against which the other two scenarios are assessed, a “Fragmented Policy” scenario as well as a “Policy Success” scenario. While various sensitivities are specifically applied to the latter (EU goes it alone, no new nuclear power plants, delayed introduction of carbon capture and storage (CCS), no biomass CCS), all of three scenarios have in common that they have an assessment horizon of 2050. The base year for the projections is 2010 and results are reported for a five-year time period. The analysis is limited to the 28 EU Member States only. The three scenarios also share a number of common assumptions such as the trajectory of population growth and number of households that are seen as drivers for energy service demand in the economy.  In Chapter 5 the core scenario results are presented. Chapter 6 presents the insights gained from the sensitivities applied to the Policy Success scenario. In Chapter 7 the key results of the study are discusses and their implications are analysed. The final conclusions of the study are presented in Chapter 8.    

The key conclusions of the report are: in the power sector negative emissions via the use of biomass CCS are essential in order to produce a technically feasible pathway in the absence of demand response and building envelope efficiency measures. In addition, 70% of generation sourced from a mixture of renewables and nuclear by 2050 is required. CCS needs to be attached to the majority of the remaining fossil fuels. In the transport, building and in the industrial sectors CO₂ reductions need to be achieved respectively by replacing gasoline with diesel, increasing end-use product efficiency as well as applying CCS. The average EU-wide carbon prices reach $300/tCO₂ in 2050. However, many technical uncertainties unavoidably pervade attempts to project future energy system developments, such as the future availability of biomass CCS.  

A follow-up report will characterize the sector-level results in more detail, and synthesise them with results from a parallel Input-Output Framework modelling activity.