Industry transformations for high service provisioning with lower energy and material demand: a review of models and scenarios
Published in Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 2024
Cite this paper
@article{wiedenhofer2024industry,
author = {Wiedenhofer, Dominik and Streeck, Jan and Wiese, Frauke and Verdolini, Elena and Mastrucci, Alessio and Ju, Yiyi and Boza-Kiss, Benigna and Min, Jihoon and Norman, Jonathan and Wieland, Hanspeter and others},
title = {Industry transformations for high service provisioning with lower energy and material demand: a review of models and scenarios},
journal = {Annual Review of Environment and Resources},
year = {2024},
volume = {49},
number = {1},
pages = {249--279},
doi = {10.1146/annurev-environ-110822-044428}
}Abstract
Developing transformative pathways for industry’s compliance with international climate targets requires model-based insights into how supply- and demand-side measures affect industry, material cycles, global supply chains, socioeconomic activities, and service provisioning that support societal well-being. We review the recent literature modeling the industrial system in low energy and material demand futures, which mitigates environmental impacts without relying on risky future negative emissions and technological fixes. We identify 77 innovative studies drawing on nine distinct industry modeling traditions. We critically assess system definitions and scopes, biophysical and thermodynamic consistency, granularity and heterogeneity, and operationalization of demand and service provisioning. We find that combined supply- and demand-side measures could reduce current economy-wide material use by 56%, energy use by 40% to 60%, and greenhouse gas emissions by 70% to net zero.