Developing Countries & Global Climate Change: Electric Power Options in Brazil

Eileen Claussen, President, Pew Center on Global Climate Change

Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world and its economy is roughly equal to that of all other South American countries combined. Yet, its greenhouse gas emissions are less than one-third of the continent's total due to the dominant role of hydropower. Total energy consumption is less than one-tenth the level in the United States and per capita carbon emissions are just 0.5 tons, compared to approximately 1.0 ton in Argentina and Mexico.

Brazil is already considered an environmental leader among developing countries and plays a significant role in the international climate change debate. Whether it is able to stay on this path will depend in part on its energy choices over the next fifteen years. This report describes the context for new power sector investments and presents three alternative policy scenarios for 2015. The report finds that:

• Construction of new hydroelectric plants is increasingly expensive and controversial due to social and environmental impacts. As a result, many new investors may favor natural gas-fired combined-cycle plants. Under a business-as-usual trajectory, carbon dioxide emissions will grow from 3.4 million tons in 1995 to 14.5 million tons in 2015, mainly due to this shift to natural gas.

• Further tightening of local environmental regulations and adoption of renewable energy policies could reduce carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide emissions by 82 percent and 75 percent, respectively, by 2015 compared to the baseline scenario, at little additional cost.

• Creating a carbon-free power sector would require an additional $25 billion in cumulative costs by 2015 — about 15 percent more than the business-as-usual scenario — and would expand the use of renewable energy resources.

• Wind power potential could be harnessed — increasing from zero to 2 percent of total installed capacity by 2015 — depending on the extent of government subsidies.

Developing Countries and Global Climate Change: Electric Power Options in Brazil is the fifth of a series commissioned by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change to examine the electric power sector in developing countries, including four other case studies of Korea, India, China, and Argentina.

The Pew Center was established in 1998 by the Pew Charitable Trusts to bring a new cooperative approach and critical scientific, economic, and technological expertise to the global climate change debate. We believe that climate change is serious business, and only through a better understanding of circumstances in individual countries can we hope to arrive at a serious response.