Water Use in India’s Power Generation: Impact of renewables and improved cooling technologies to 2030 analyses the prospective impact of renewable energy deployment, along with recently mandated changes to power plant cooling systems, on water use in India’s electricity sector. Looking at the expected freshwater intensity of non-hydro power generation under different scenarios, the analysis aims to quantify the impact of India’s energy transition on freshwater use. The findings highlight the need to incorporate water considerations into energy planning.
The World Resources Institute and the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) conducted the analysis using data compiled from various sources on water withdrawal and consumption. The study considers the impact on water use in the context of IRENA’s REmap India analysis as well as power-sector scenarios from India’s Central Electricity Authority (CEA). The resulting brief focuses on India’s power generation at the national level.
Informal economic activities across much of sub-Saharan Africa provide crucial cash income and employment for both rural and urban populations. Governing the informal economy is recognised as a key policy challenge due to its contribution to local livelihoods and its common association with illegality, tax evasion and negative environmental impacts. In addition, because of the increasingly globalised trade in commodities, parts of the informal economy can also be supported by global sources of capital. This ‘globalised’ rural informal economy urgently calls for innovative policies, which maximise the benefits of global capital flowing directly to rural populations, while minimising the negative impacts associated with the environment, revenue losses and resource governance.
The production of Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) from organic waste for use as a vehicle fuel is an emerging strategy that businesses, states, and municipalities in the United States are pursuing to make use of waste-derived methane and lower the carbon footprint of vehicle fleets.
The Production and Use of Renewable Natural Gas as a Climate Strategy in the United States explores RNG’s potential as a climate-change strategy in the U.S., including the conditions under which it can achieve large greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions compared to fossil fuels used to power vehicles.
