Academician Liu Ke: Electric vehicles are currently increasing carbon emissions

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The national carbon market officially opened on July 16. Recently, Liu Ke, a foreign member of the Australian Academy of Engineering and dean of the School of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Southern University of Science and Technology, delivered a special lecture titled “Myths about Carbon Neutrality and Practical Paths to Achieving It” at the “Academics’ Lecture Hall for Scientific and Technological Innovation” in Shenzhen. Academician Liu Ke said, “If the energy structure doesn’t change, if 67% of the power grid still comes from coal-fired power, then electric vehicles will increase carbon emissions rather than reducing them.” Only when the energy mix and the power grid are composed mostly of renewable energy sources can electric vehicles be considered clean energy.” Academician Liu Ke points out that there are currently six misconceptions regarding carbon neutrality. The industry has a limited understanding of the challenges associated with it, and several mistakes exist: Misconception 1: The belief that wind and solar energy are cheaper than coal power, and therefore that solar and wind energy can completely replace coal power to achieve carbon neutrality. In fact, there are 8,760 hours per year, and the number of hours during which solar energy can generate electricity varies from place to place, with an average of around 1,700 hours ； In other words, solar power is roughly 1/5 to 1/6 cheaper than thermal power for that period of time ； And during the other 5/6 of the time, the cost of storing electricity would be much higher than that of using thermal power. Myth 2: People think there is some magical large-scale energy storage technology, but in reality, the energy industry does not have Moore’s Law like the computer industry. “After more than 100 years of research and development, the energy density of batteries has not seen any revolutionary changes; to this day, the cheapest method for large-scale energy storage at the GW level remains pumped hydro storage, a technology that was invented over 100 years ago. Myth 3: Carbon dioxide is used to produce chemicals, but on a large scale, using carbon dioxide for this purpose does not contribute to carbon reduction. About 87% of the world’s oil is burned, while about 13% of it is used to produce all our petrochemical products. The contribution of converting carbon dioxide into other chemicals to carbon reduction is quite limited. Myth 4: Believing that CCUS (carbon capture, utilization, and storage) technology can achieve carbon neutrality. Theoretically, it is possible to capture and purify the carbon dioxide emitted during the production process, and then reuse it in new production processes or store it, thereby enabling large-scale capture of carbon dioxide. However, “carbon neutrality is not just a technical issue; it is also a comprehensive issue related to the balance between economic and social development,” emphasized Academician Liu Ke. With current technology, the costs are very high, complete carbon sequestration cannot be achieved, and it is also difficult to replenish carbon dioxide in nature. To date, the amount of CO2 emissions reduced through CCS or CCUS remains very limited. Myth 5: Believing that carbon neutrality can be achieved by improving energy efficiency. By improving energy efficiency, carbon emissions in industrial processes and product use can be significantly reduced. China’s energy efficiency did see a notable increase during the first 20 years, but during the same period, the total amount of carbon emissions not only failed to decrease but actually increased considerably. Therefore, improving energy efficiency is an important means of reducing carbon emissions. However, as long as fossil fuels are used, the contribution of improved energy efficiency to achieving carbon neutrality remains quite limited. Indeed, improving energy efficiency is the cheapest way to reduce carbon emissions, and it should be given top priority. Myth 6: There is a hope to replace gasoline vehicles with electric vehicles in order to reduce carbon emissions, but in fact the competition between electric and gasoline vehicles began a hundred years ago. Academician Liu Ke said, “If the energy structure doesn’t change, if 67% of the power grid still comes from coal-fired power, then electric vehicles will increase carbon emissions rather than reducing them.” Only when the energy mix and the power grid are composed mostly of renewable energy sources can electric vehicles be considered clean energy.” How can carbon neutrality be achieved in the future? Academician Liu Ke proposed several practical approaches to achieving carbon neutrality: the first approach is to create a low-carbon energy system by combining existing coal chemical industries with renewable energy sources. On the one hand, it enables existing coal chemical industries to achieve net-zero carbon emissions; on the other hand, it involves using solar, wind, and nuclear energy to electrolyze water in order to produce green hydrogen and oxygen. By avoiding water-gas shift reactions, **CO2 emissions from coal-based methanol production are reduced. The second approach is to utilize carbon-neutralization technologies in the coal sector—micro-mining separation technology. Before coal is burned, combustible materials and pollutants-containing minerals are separated to produce a low-cost liquid-like fuel plus a soil conditioner, thereby addressing coal pollution, excessive use of chemical fertilizers, and soil ecological issues at the source; simultaneously, high-value chemicals such as methanol and hydrogen can be produced at low cost. The third approach is to achieve integrated development of photovoltaics and agriculture, by combining photovoltaics with agriculture, livestock farming, water resource utilization, and desert management, in order to integrate photovoltaics with desert management as well as to jointly reduce carbon emissions through the use of photovoltaics in agriculture. The fourth approach is the integrated use of peak-valley electricity and thermal energy storage. Thermal power plants must remain operational even at night; between 12 midnight and 6 a.m., although these plants continue to emit large amounts of carbon dioxide, the electricity they generate is not used by anyone ； By using distributed thermal storage modules to store electricity in the form of heat during off-peak hours, and then utilizing this heat for heating or air conditioning when needed, it is possible to **reduce carbon dioxide emissions and achieve a true transition from coal to electricity. Combined with rooftop solar power systems and regional economic strategies, further reductions in energy consumption can be achieved. The fifth approach is to use renewable energy to produce methanol, which is then used for distributed power generation. Methanol hydrogen distributed energy can be used to replace all applications that rely on diesel engines, and it can complement other unstable renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power.