Renewables Expansion and Supporting Infrastructures for A Net-zero Energy System Transition of Germany by 2050

Abstract

We analysed transition pathways for the energy system in Germany under a pre-defined carbon budget to comply with the global “well below 1.5°C” target, reaching net-zero by 2050 [1]. The energy system is modelled under a cost optimization approach with consideration of future energy and electricity demands from various end-use sectors (industry, households, transport, commerce, trade and services). Our analysis is focused on Germany, which is divided into 10 regions with 12 additional nodes representing its neighboring countries. Our approach focuses especially on capacity expansion of renewables as well as of supporting infrastructures for the generation, storage and transport of electricity, hydrogen and synthetic methane. Future capacities of 90 technologies are calculated in an hourly resolution for the scenario years of 2020, 2030, 2040 and 2050. The results show interactions among the utilization of renewable energies and the balancing of fluctuating generation and demand. As the optimization of the power system highly depends on several key assumptions, such as fuel costs, availability of renewable resources and power import dependency, we also test four sensitivity cases for the power sector. The sensitivity analysis focuses on the variations of minimum domestic power generation shares from 90% in the base scenario to 80% in the high-import scenario or even 95% in the low-import scenario, assumed maximum PV generation potentials and lower biomass cost assumptions.