The EU power generation system is well on its way to decarbonization, but that does not take away the need for further energy efficiency improvements. We have calculated the GHG emissions, land use and material use of 1 MWh of electricity per year in the EU in the period between 2025 and 2045. This 20-year period corresponds with the typical life-time of devices such as medium power electrical motors.

The consumption of 1 MWh of electricity per year in the period of 2025 and 2045 leads to:

• GHG EMISSIONS: 146 kg of CO2eq average emissions per year.
• LAND USE: 3453 points of land use, which corresponds to 26.36 m2 of typical non-irrigated cropland. Note that the land use points only take the competition for land and certain aspects of biodiversity into account, and not the impact on the landscape and its perception by EU citizens.
• MATERIAL USE: 490 kg of material use (all materials combined, for the case of onshore wind turbine). The extra material needed in a 110 kW induction motor to move from IE3 to IE4 efficiency level is about 93 kg, which allows to save 3.8 MWh/year, assuming 3500 hours full load equivalent per year. This results in a highly positive material balance, as 93 kg of additional material used in the motor lead 1850 kg of material savings in electricity generation infrastructure.

CONCLUSION The figures above demonstrate that efforts to harvest additional energy savings still make sense, today as well as in the years to come. The evolution of the electricity price over the next 20 to 40 years is difficult to predict, which can make it hard to assess energy efficiency pay-back times in a highly accurate manner. However, the environmental benefits of each MWh saved are irrefutable.