The World Has Never Faced a Challenge Like Decarbonization
For the energy sector, the stakes couldn’t be higher, as electricity demand rises along with calls to shrink carbon emissions.
The world is at an impasse. Everyone needs energy and the demand is quickly increasing. But the way power has been generated in the past has not come without significant environmental costs.
For the world to move forward in a more sustainable way, something has to change. The answer is decarbonization.
An opportunity – and a challenge – like no other, decarbonization has goals ranging from global commitments to cap temperature rise; national CO2 reduction targets; company goals, like GE’s commitment to be carbon neutral by 2030; and individual commitments, like using only low-electricity LED bulbs.
However, achieving these goals and pursuing decarbonization can’t happen in a vacuum. Governments, policymakers, and utility companies need to balance this urgent need with the equally critical requirement to ensure reliable and affordable access to energy.
Thanks to constant innovation and advances across virtually all generation technologies, costs have dropped for renewables, while the carbon footprint has shrunk, and flexibility has increased for conventional energy production.
That’s important because decarbonization isn’t about an immediate switch from one source to another: it’s about constant innovation and incremental changes, creating a resilient and diverse energy mix.
Ultimately, this will result in a transition from primarily using fossil fuels for energy generation to a mix led by renewables, but with an important role for traditional power generation like natural gas. With global energy demand predicted by some to rise 2.8% a year through 2040, we’re going to need a diverse energy mix to continue to meet demand and provide stability.
GE has been developing energy solutions for a long time, both innovating to upgrade legacy fuel sources, as well as harness new ones. Improved efficiency means generating more electricity from the same amount of fuel or reducing emissions per unit of output. With the HA heavy duty gas turbine, GE has achieved record-breaking advances in efficiencies. Through digital monitoring and management of solar, hydro, and wind, increasing revenue while reducing costs and lowering risks is part of the modern energy management solution.
Driving efficiency gains also applies to renewable power generation. GE is building increasingly efficient wind turbines that can create more units of power from the same amount of wind. GE solutions in energy storage, transmission, and delivery are increasing grid reliability and efficiency, and preparing them, in part through AI-enhanced software, to manage the on-again, off-again nature of wind and solar.
Another aspect of tomorrow’s grid that GE is helping prepare for is the growing electrification of industry, transportation, and daily life. As the world sees more electric vehicles and energy-generating smart homes with personal battery storage, grids will need to react dynamically to the countless interactions with the grid that this electrified world represents.
The wide diversity of available technologies and approaches already available, not to mention the many more still to be invented and upgraded, suggests that opportunities will abound along the global decarbonization journey.