Assessing the land requirements to decarbonise our electricity systems in OSeMOSYS

A new peer-reviewed publication by Palmer-Wilson et al.  from University of Victoria  in Canada and Oregon State University in the U.S. adopted OSeMOSYS  to model the electricity system of Alberta, Canada, and investigate the land requirements associated with different decarbonisation pathways. The study found that to decarbonising strategies heavily relying on solar and wind technologies might cause a high increase in the land area occupied by the electricity system nowadays. In addition, there will still be need for a large share of dispatchable capacity to satisfy the demand. Finally, to reach a lower land impact with similar decarbonisation targets, up to 11% higher investment cost will be needed.