Publication:
Thirsty Energy : Understanding the Linkages between Energy and Water

Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Files in English
English PDF revd (3.91 MB)
3,169 downloads
English Text (169.5 KB)
130 downloads
Published
2015-01
ISSN
Date
2015-03-10
Editor(s)
Abstract
Population growth and economic development, aggravated by climate change, will increase pressure on energy and water resources. Integrated planning can make the most of these two essential and scarce resources. Thirsty Energy, a World Bank initiative, helps countries address these issues and ensure sustainable development of both resources. This note focuses on the water needs of the power sector and particularly answers the following questions: Why is this issue important? Do power plants need all that much water? What about other types of plants? What are the challenges? and, What are our options?
Link to Data Set
Citation
Delgado, Anna; Rodriguez, Diego J.; Sohns, Antonia A.. 2015. Thirsty Energy : Understanding the Linkages between Energy and Water. Live Wire, 2015/41. © http://hdl.handle.net/10986/21576 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.
Digital Object Identifier
Associated URLs
Associated content
Report Series
Report Series
Live Wire
Other publications in this report series
  • Publication
    Measuring the Climate Resilience of the Power Sector: Harmonization, Not Homogenization
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-08-31) World Bank
    Although by its very nature climate resilience can never be fully “standardized”, the development and mainstreaming of climate resilience metrics can benefit from greater consensus around key topics. Areas such as metric categories, methodologies, and reporting frameworks can be aligned through coordinated efforts among regulators, utilities, and other stakeholders, enabling more consistent, effective, and scalable resilience planning across the sector. The key is harmonization and not homogenization.
  • Publication
    Exploiting the Potential of Energy Efficiency in Residential Buildings
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-10-31) Singh, Jas; Mori, Takeshi
    The residential sector makes up about 70 percent of building energy demand. This demand is expected to grow rapidly over the next decade. Although the sector offers huge potential for energy efficiency gains, a range of barriers impedes the realization of these benefits. Fortunately, a wealth of global experience shows how these challenges can be overcome through a combination of sound planning, strong policy and regulatory frameworks, well designed financing and incentives, robust institutional and market development, and accessible information to scale up residential energy efficiency.
  • Publication
    Decarbonizing Ammonia and Nitrogen Fertilizers with Clean Hydrogen
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-03-12) World Bank
    Synthetic fertilizers are essential to sustaining the world’s population, but their production is responsible for 1.8–2.4 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Clean hydrogen holds growing potential (amid falling costs) to decarbonize fertilizer production. Hydrogen produces synthetic ammonia, a building block of most fertilizers. With the fertilizer market as a reliable off-taker, this shift could support the overall expansion of clean hydrogen, even as it boosts global food security. However, this transition may require adjustments, including changes in fertilizer types and modifications to existing subsidy schemes.
  • Publication
    Shared Infrastructure for Clean Hydrogen
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-08-31) World Bank
    Studies of the development of clean hydrogen have often focused on the production side. Infrastructure built and used for storage and transportation warrants more attention. Among the topics that should be assessed are system design, operation, integration, and ownership; market design and governance; and planning. This Live Wire examines case studies and literature on the infrastructure for hydrogen hubs, with an emphasis on the benefits of shared infrastructure. Given the breadth of hydrogen production and infrastructure, the focus is on renewable hydrogen production for domestic use and for export after conversion to ammonia.
  • Publication
    Using Biomass or Green Ammonia to Replace Coal in Existing Thermal Power Plants
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-06-06) Tavoulareas, Stratos
    Finding fuel sources to replace coal in power plants is crucial in the march toward decarbonization. Biomass and ammonia are two options offering significant potential. Both can be used with coal or alone in newly constructed facilities or in modified power plants. Relatively new power plants are good candidates for modification. While work is underway demonstrating the feasibility of each material, there are logistical challenges to address, particularly in the case of ammonia.
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections

Related items

Showing items related by metadata.

  • Publication
    Thirsty Energy
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2013-06) Rodriguez, Diego J.; Delgado, Anna; DeLaquil, Pat; Sohns, Antonia
    The tradeoffs between energy and water have been gaining international attention in recent years as demand for both resources mount and governments continue to struggle to ensure reliable supply to meet sectoral needs. As almost all energy generation processes require significant amounts of water, and water requires energy for treatment and transport, these two resources are inextricably linked. This relationship is the energy-water nexus. Section one of this paper examines the existing models, literature, and management frameworks on the nexus, as it seeks to determine what gaps exist. Section two describes the water demands of power generation in order to identify potential areas of future uncertainty and delineate areas where integrated energy-water management may improve the reliability of operating power plants and the viability of schemes. Finally, section three describes possible solutions that may alleviate challenges resulting from the link between energy and water by improving energy efficiency and integrating water resources management into energy planning.
  • Publication
    Guidelines for Economic Analysis of Power Sector Projects
    (Washington, DC, 2015-09) World Bank
    These guidelines are directed to the economic analysis of power sector policy analysis and the appraisal of power sector investment projects. The general guidance is complemented by an Annex Volume that contains relevant technical notes, a glossary, and an extended Bibliography. In this first edition, the focus of the technical notes is on grid-connected renewable energy projects. In FY16 the scope of the technical notes will be extended to cover transmission & distribution, rural electrification, off-grid, energy efficiency, and thermal projects.
  • Publication
    Options for a Low Carbon Energy Future in Morocco
    (Washington, DC, 2009-11) World Bank
    Morocco s economy is growing rapidly in all its sectors (tourism, agriculture, industry , etc.) Consequently, the energy demand has been increasing steadily in the period 2003-2007 when primary energy demand rose by 5% per annum and electricity demand by 8% per annum. At the request of the World Bank Group, this study was launched having 3 main objectives: An analysis of the current characteristics of energy supply and demand, the assessment of the energy strategy of Morocco for the coming years, and then a development of an alternative energy scenario with low carbon energies. Beicip-Franlab has established a detailed energy balance of Morocco on the basis ofMoroccan and international studies already conducted on the energy sector of Morocco as well as on well known databases like IEA ones.For the period 2009-2030, Morocco has defined an energy strategy which was presented during the first Assises de l Energie organized in March 2009. An assessment of this strategy considering both energy and environmental criteria will be presented in order to be compared with the business as usual scenario.Finally an alternative scenario is proposed. Based on an intensive introduction ofrenewable energy (RE) and energy efficiency (EE), this scenario would permit a great exploitation of the available RE potential in Morocco, and particularly its wind power potential. In November 2009 after the present report is finalized, Moroccan authorities presented a solar power plan which increases its renewable energy target in 2020, making solar energy target comparable to its wind energy target.A quick review of this new solar plan is presented at the end of this report.
  • Publication
    Handshake, No. 2 (July 2011)
    (International Finance Corporation, Washington, DC, 2011-07) International Finance Corporation
    This issue includes the following headings: renewable energy: wind and solar; energy efficiency: green building; and green finance: infrastructure finance.
  • Publication
    A Review of Solar Energy : Markets, Economics and Policies
    (2011-10-01) Timilsina, Govinda R.; Kurdgelashvili, Lado; Narbel, Patrick A.
    Solar energy has experienced phenomenal growth in recent years due to both technological improvements resulting in cost reductions and government policies supportive of renewable energy development and utilization. This study analyzes the technical, economic and policy aspects of solar energy development and deployment. While the cost of solar energy has declined rapidly in the recent past, it still remains much higher than the cost of conventional energy technologies. Like other renewable energy technologies, solar energy benefits from fiscal and regulatory incentives and mandates, including tax credits and exemptions, feed-in-tariff, preferential interest rates, renewable portfolio standards and voluntary green power programs in many countries. Potential expansion of carbon credit markets also would provide additional incentives to solar energy deployment; however, the scale of incentives provided by the existing carbon market instruments, such as the Clean Development Mechanism of the Kyoto Protocol, is limited. Despite the huge technical potential, development and large-scale, market-driven deployment of solar energy technologies world-wide still has to overcome a number of technical and financial barriers. Unless these barriers are overcome, maintaining and increasing electricity supplies from solar energy will require continuation of potentially costly policy supports.

Users also downloaded

Showing related downloaded files

  • Publication
    Digital Africa
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-03-13) Begazo, Tania; Dutz, Mark Andrew; Blimpo, Moussa
    All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. "Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs" shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing, digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, it can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth. These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at least 3G mobile internet service now cover 84 percent of Africa’s population, but only 22 percent uses such services. And the average African business lags in the use of smartphones and computers as well as more sophisticated digital technologies that catalyze further productivity gains. Two issues explain the usage gap: affordability of these new technologies and willingness to use them. For the 40 percent of Africans below the extreme poverty line, mobile data plans alone would cost one-third of their incomes—in addition to the price of access devices, apps, and electricity. Data plans for small- and medium-size businesses are also more expensive than in other regions. Moreover, shortcomings in the quality of internet services—and in the supply of attractive, skills-appropriate apps that promote entrepreneurship and raise earnings—dampen people’s willingness to use them. For those countries already using these technologies, the development payoffs are significant. New empirical studies for this report add to the rapidly growing evidence that mobile internet availability directly raises enterprise productivity, increases jobs, and reduces poverty throughout Africa. To realize these and other benefits more widely, Africa’s countries must implement complementary and mutually reinforcing policies to strengthen both consumers’ ability to pay and willingness to use digital technologies. These interventions must prioritize productive use to generate large numbers of inclusive jobs in a region poised to benefit from a massive, youthful workforce—one projected to become the world’s largest by the end of this century.
  • Publication
    Independent Evaluation of IFC's Development Results 2008 : IFC's Additionality in Supporting Private Sector Development
    (Washington, DC : International Finance Corporation, 2008) Independent Evaluation Group
    The Independent Evaluation of International Finance Corporations (IFC's) Development Results (IEDR) is the annual flagship report of the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG). It reviews IFC's effectiveness in supporting private sector development and its contributions to economic growth and poverty reduction, as well as to environmentally and socially sustainable development. The main purpose of the IEDR is to provide an independent assessment to the Executive Board, IFC Management, and the wider development community about recent trends in IFC's performance, and to stimulate debate and action on IFC strategy and operational processes going forward. The report also serves as a source of knowledge and learning about private sector development, in general, and about development impact, more specifically. This year's IEDR contains two main themes. The first is a review of the development results achieved by IFC-supported operations. On the investment side, this means looking at how well operations that reached early operating maturity during 2005-07 performed, in terms of their financial and economic results relative to specific market benchmarks as well as their environmental and social effects and contributions to private sector development beyond the project. For advisory services, the report presents some emerging results of 293 operations that were closed during 2004-06 and which were evaluated on a pilot basis as part of wider efforts under way to assess performance in this area. The second theme of the report is a preliminary, ex-post look at the 'additionality' or unique role and contribution that IFC brings to its clients through its investment and advisory services operations.
  • Publication
    Direct and Indirect Impacts of Transport Mobility on Access to Jobs: Evidence from South Africa
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-11-12) Iimi, Atsushi
    Access to jobs is essential for economic growth. In Africa, unemployment rates are notably high. This paper reexamines the relationship between transport mobility and labor market outcomes, with a particular focus on the direct and indirect effects of transport connectivity. As predicted by theory, wages are influenced by the level of commuting deterrence. Generally, higher earnings are associated with longer commute times and/or higher commuting costs. Local accessibility is also important, especially for individuals with time constraints. Both direct and indirect impacts are found to be significant in South Africa, where job accessibility has been challenging since the end of apartheid. For the direct impact, the wage elasticity associated with commuting costs is significant. Returns on commute are particularly high for women. Local accessibility to socioeconomic facilities, such as shops and health services, is also found to have a significant impact, consistent with the concept of mobility of care. To enhance employment, therefore, it is crucial to connect people not only to job locations but also to various socioeconomic points of interest, such as markets and hospitals, in an integrated manner. This integration will enable individuals to spend more time working and commuting longer distances.
  • Publication
    Taxes, Spending, and Equity: International Patterns and Lessons for Developing Countries
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-11-17) Wai-Poi, Matthew; Sosa, Mariano; Bachas, Pierre
    Taxes and public spending underpin the basic administration of government and finance the human capital and infrastructure investments needed for economic growth. They can also have a significant and immediate impact on poverty and inequality. The question of how public finance can support longer-term growth objectives while promoting equity has become even more important in recent years, given the high fiscal deficits and debt levels most countries emerged with in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. These included the increasing cost of debt and the need to restart environmentally sustainable growth while helping households address the learning losses and other social scars caused by the pandemic. This paper examines the global evidence on which households pay which taxes and who benefits from what spending, and critically, the net effect on different households across the income distribution. The aim is to identify the patterns and lessons that emerge for designing progressive fiscal policies. A global dataset of 96 countries is assembled, spanning all regions of the world and all national income levels, grounded in the Commitment to Equity (CEQ) approach to fiscal incidence.
  • Publication
    Public Expenditure Tracking and Service Delivery Survey : Education and Health in Honduras - Background Chapters
    (World Bank, 2010-09-01) World Bank
    This report aims at providing the Government of Honduras (GOH) with a tool to improve efficiency in the management of existing public resources in the education and health sectors, in order to increase access and provide better education and health services to the poor. Specifically, the objectives of the study are to: i) identify how resources are allocated and used in the education and health sectors; ii) identify leakages and inefficiencies in the system; iii) analyze how existing management models perform and how different public management instruments are applied in each sector; and iv) issue recommendations for improving the management of resources in the education and health sectors. The education and health sectors account for 46.2 percent of Central Government expenditures and have been highlighted as major drivers of growth. The main focus of the analysis in the education sector are the funds allocated to human resources given that it accounts for more than 80 per cent of the budget. The report presents the methodology and main findings from the survey that was carried out between November 2008 and October 2009. The main recommendation of the report is that an effort should be made in order to improve the scope, quality and transparency of the information collected on the provision of education and health services.