Energy in Sweden

Energy, electricity and CO2 emissions trends overview

The emissions decline 7.7% in 2008–2009 was at least partly influenced by the European economic recession of 2008–2009 and not only by the sustainable changes in energy consumption. From 2008 to 2009 the change in the US was a 7.0% decline and in Canada was a 9.6% decline.

A report was published in 2011 by the World Energy Council in association with Oliver Wyman, entitled Policies for the Future: 2011 Assessment of Country Energy and Climate Policies, which ranks country performance according to an energy sustainability index. The best performers were Switzerland, Sweden and France.

Buildings and the residential sector currently account for 40 percent of Sweden's energy consumption. Buildings have a long life-span. Thus energy efficiency is important for houses being built. Better energy efficiency for existing buildings is the biggest challenge.

Renewable energy

Within the context of the European Union's 2009 Renewables Directive, Sweden is working towards reaching a 49% share of renewable energy in gross final consumption of energy - electricity, heating/cooling, and transportation - by 2020. Eurostat reported that Sweden had already exceeded the Directive's 2020 target in 2014 reaching 52.6% of total final energy consumption provided by renewables (it was just 38.7% in 2004). This makes Sweden the leading country within the EU-28 group in terms of renewable energy use by share, followed by Finland and Latvia on 38.7%, Austria on 33.1% and Denmark on 29.2%. The two other signaturies to the directive, Iceland and Norway, remain ahead of Sweden on 77.1% and 69.2% respectively.

The 2014 52.6% overall share of final energy consumption in Sweden breaks down as renewable energy providing the following shares to each sector: 68.1% of the heating and cooling sector, 63.3% of the electricity sector and 19.2% of the transport sector.

The share of renewable electricity use is high in Sweden; hydro, wind, and solar power together accounted for 49.8% of the electricity produced in the country in 2014 (when measured against national electricity consumption, however, this amount rises to 55.5%). Since 2003, Sweden has supported renewable energy in the electricity sector with a "green electricity certificate" obligation for retail power suppliers. The current plan of the certificate system is to support 25 TWh of new renewable electricity generation by 2020.

In June 2016, the Swedish center-left minority coalition government reached a cross-party energy deal with three opposition parties (the Moderate Party, Centre Party (Sweden), and Christian Democrats (Sweden)), with the agreement targeting 100% renewable electricity production by 2040.

In 2013 renewable energy investment was more than US$1 billion in Sweden.

Wind power

Wind power accounted for 10% of the electricity generated in Sweden in 2015, up from 5% in 2012 and 2.4% in 2010.

Sweden has wind power potential of 510 TWh/a at land and 46 TWh/a at sea. Consumption was 140 TWh of power in 2010.

In 2013 Sweden was second top country for wind power capacity per inhabitant in the world: 488 W per person. In correlation one must note that Swedish use of energy per inhabitant is much higher than average in Europe.

Wave power

Sweden has a wave power station outside Lysekil.

Hydroelectric power

Hydroelectric power in Sweden accounts for more than half of energy production. More than 1900 power stations operate all over the country. Forty-five produce 100 MW and over, 17 produce 200 MW and over, and 6 produce 400 MW and over. The largest station, which is located on the upper Lule River, has a maximum production capacity of 977 MW. The Lule River is also the most productive river, with almost 18% of the Swedish installed effect. Almost all of the medium to large plants are located in northern Sweden.

Solar power

While installations have historically been minimal, solar power has recently been growing quickly in Sweden with the country's cumulative PV capacity nearly doubling in 2014 to 79 MW.

Biofuels

Sweden aims for a fossil fuel free vehicle fleet by 2030.

Sweden published the sustainability criteria for biofuels (2011) which consider the areas with high biological values to be protected in respect to fuels production. The feedstock origin used for production of bioliquids in Sweden during 2011 was Sweden 49% The Netherlands 17% United States 17% Finland 6% Belgium 3% and other 8% (Brazil, Malaysia and Russia). Palm oil is often pointed out as a dirty feed-stock for biofuels. None of the Swedish companies used palm oil in 2011. The largest share of feedstock for bioliquids comes from the forest industry in the form of tall oil pitch, tall oil and methanol.

In 2013 the bus fleets in more than a dozen cities relied entirely on biomethane, local plants produced more than 60% of the total biomethane used in Swedish natural gas vehicles, and more filling stations were opened in 2012 and 2013. Goteborg Energi (Gothenburg Energy) has a 20 MW facility that gasifies forest residues and then converts the synthesis gases—hydrogen and carbon monoxide—into biomethane.

Thermal and Nuclear

Nuclear is dominating in this sector. The other operational plant is, in almost all cases, fueled with renewable fuels. Oil plants are few, and are either decommissioned or used as a reserve,

Nuclear power

More than 35% of the Swedish electricity is produced by 10 nuclear reactors, spread out on 3 power stations:

Before 2005, there were 12 reactors, but the two BWR reactors (~1,2 GW) at the Barsebäck nuclear power plant were decommissioned in 1999 and 2005.

Global warming

According to Energy Information Administration the CO₂ emissions from energy consumption of Sweden were in 2009 54.77 Mt, slightly below Finland 54.86 Mt, despite the difference in the population. The emissions per capita were in Sweden 5.58 and in Finland 9.93 tonnes per capita in 2009.