The efficiency of electricity and heat production from conventional thermal power plants in EU-27countries improved between 1990 and 2010 by 5.8 percentage points (from 45.4% in 1990 to 51.2% in 2010). The non EU EEA countries (exl. Norway [1] ) show a similar trend with an improvement of 5.6 percentage points (from 45.2% in 1990 to 50.8% in 2010). Between 2005 and 2010, there was a decline in efficiency of electricity and heat production from conventional thermal power plants of 1.1 percentage points (from 52.3% in 2005 to 51.2% in 2010) in the EU-27 because of lower heat production similar to non-EU EEA countries where efficiency declined by 1.3% over the same period.
[1] Norway, displays efficiencies higher than 100% for thermal generation due to the extensive use of electric boilers for heat production. In the Eurostat statistics, the heat is included in the output, while the electricity input is not. For power plants the consumption of electricity is attributed to the energy sector while partly may be in fact used as input for heat. For these reasons, Norway was excluded from the calculations.
Output from conventional thermal power stations consists of gross electricity generation and also of any heat sold to third parties (combined heat and power plants) by conventional thermal public utility power stations as well as autoproducer thermal power stations.
Output from conventional thermal power stations consists of gross electricity generation and also of any heat sold to third parties (combined heat and power plants) by conventional thermal public utility power stations as well as autoproducer thermal power stations.
Output from conventional thermal power stations consists of gross electricity generation and also of any heat sold to third parties (combined heat and power plants) by conventional thermal public utility power stations as well as autoproducer thermal power stations.
The figure on the left is including district heat and the figure on the right is excluding district heat.
Left figure: Efficiency of conventional thermal electricity and heat production (including district heat).
Right figure: Efficiency of conventional thermal electricity and heat production (excluding district heat)
Data about the EU emission trading system (ETS). The EU ETS data viewer provides aggregated data by country, by sector and by year on the verified emissions, allowances and surrendered units of more than 12 000 installations covered by the EU emission trading system.
Data about the EU emission trading system (ETS). The EU ETS data viewer provides aggregated data by country, by sector and by year on the verified emissions, allowances and surrendered units of more than 12 000 installations covered by the EU emission trading system.
Data about the EU emission trading system (ETS). The EU ETS data viewer provides aggregated data by country, by sector and by year on the verified emissions, allowances and surrendered units of more than 12 000 installations covered by the EU emission trading system.
The EU27 is still heavily dependent on fossil fuels, and it accounts for 76.4 % of primary energy consumption whereas renewables accounted only for 9.8 %. The share of fossil fuels (coal, lignite, oil and natural gas) in gross inland consumption of the EU-27 declined slightly from 83.1 % in 1990 to 76.4 % in 2010.
The EU’s dependence on imports of fossil fuels (gas, solid fuels and oil) [1] from non-EU countries has remained relatively stable between 2005 and 2010. In 2010 EU-27 imported 53.8 % of its total gross inland energy consumption. Oil imports are the highest and accounted for 58.6 % of total GIEC, followed by gas then solid fuels which accounted for 28.8 % and 12.6 % of total GIEC.
In 2010 only 71.5 % of the total primary energy consumption in the EU-27 reached the end users. Between 1990 and 2010, energy losses in transformation and distribution have slowly declined from 29.2 % to 28.5 %.
The average energy efficiency of conventional thermal electricity and heat production of conventional thermal power stations and district heating plants in the EU-27 improved over the period 1990 and 2010 by 5.1 percentage points to reach 51.2% in 2010. The main increase was seen between 1990 and 2005 with an increase of 7.0 percentage points (from 45.4% in 1990 to 52.3% in 2005). The improvement until 2005 was due to the closure of old inefficient plants, improvements in existing technologies, often combined with a switch from coal power plants to more efficient combined cycle gas-turbines. Between 2005 and 2010, there was a slight fall in efficiency of electricity and heat production from conventional thermal power plants and district heating plants of 1.1 percentage points (from 52.3% in 2005 to 51.2% in 2010) because of lower heat production.
Overview of the energy system in 2010
In 2010 only 71.5 % of the total primary energy consumption in the EU-27 reached end users. Distribution, energy-sector’s own consumption of energy and conversion losses represented 28.5 % of which 5 % resulted from energy consumption by the energy sector.
The EU27 is still heavily dependent on fossil fuels (see ENER 26), and it accounts for 76.4 % of primary energy consumption whereas renewables accounted only for 9.8 %. It is interesting to see that over 65 % total petroleum products in the EU27 after transformation in refineries are those refined in the EU27 originating from indigenous production and imported crude oil, rather than imported petroleum products. Subsequently 340 Mtoe of these petroleum products are exported outside the EU27.
A high proportion of the fossil fuels used in the EU27 in 2010 were imported from outside the EU. Net import accounted for 91 %, 62 % and 39 % of gross inland consumptions of oil, gas and solid fuels.
The high dependency on oil arises as a result of high consumption in the transport sector which is still very dependent on petrol and diesel. Increasing concerns for climate change leading to policies shifting fuel use in the transport sector has led to electricity (15.1 Mtoe) and renewables (13.3 Mtoe) consumption in transport, but these are yet to make a significant contribution (see ENER 16). The other sector where oil is the most dominant fuel is in the non-energy use sector where oil is used for example as lubricants. On the other hand, oil only accounts for a small proportion of the transformation input into power stations [2] (ENER 38).
Nuclear heat accounts for 44.2 % of transformational input into power stations (excluding CHPs and district heating), followed by coal (24.9 %), natural gas (15.4 %) then renewables (13.5 %). In power stations, during the transformation of the energy into electricity, 58 % of fuel input is lost as conversion losses. Conversion losses are declining in the EU27 as power station efficiencies and electricity generation from renewables increases (see ENER 19 and 38). As for wind, hydro and solar PV, electricity is the primary energy form of energy so there are no associated conversion losses. The overall % of energy lost to conversion losses from electricity generation can also decrease if the % of electricity generated from CHPs increases. In 2010, conversion losses from CHPs were much less than power stations (33 %), just over 20 % of transformation output of electricity was from CHPs.
In terms of consumption, industries consumed the highest amount of electricity, but only slightly more than domestic and other final consumers (which includes services sector) (ENER 16). Following conversion losses in transformation plants, further losses of electricity occur from distribution and consumption in the energy industry which accounts for (41.2 Mtoe or 14.5 % of electricity available for consumption). In 2010, net import of electricity was minimal (0.3 Mtoe).
Conversion efficiencies of CHPs are higher than in power stations because the heat produced is also consumed as useful energy. In the EU27, heat is also generated from district heating plants in certain countries and the overall heat consumed from CHPs and district heating plants in 2010 was 62.8 Mtoe. Gas accounts for the highest proportion of fuel going into district heating plants (46 %).
The largest consumer of gas in 2010 was the domestic sector (119.0 Mtoe) followed by industries (84.7 Mtoe) (see ENER 16) whereas for coal, the largest consumers are electricity generation plants (power stations and CHPs). Coal and gas are also input fuels for other transformation plants which produce manufactured fuels.
[1] Definitions are provided in the meta data. The Gross Inland Energy Consumption does not include bunkers.
[2] See ‘Methodology and assumptions used for the Sankey diagram’ for definitions of components that make up power stations.
Over the period 1990-2010, energy efficiency increased by 20% in EU-27 countries at an annual average rate of 1.1%/year, driven by improvements in the industrial sector (1.7%/year) and households (1.6%/year).
The bars show proved oil and natural gas reserves by country. Only countries with more than 20 billion barrels of oil are shown (top maps). Only countries with more than 3 billion cubic metres are shown (bottom maps).
International comparison
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