EU net zero carbon energy scenarios

Hi all,

Does anyone know where to find net zero, or low, carbon energy scenarios at the European scale?
I only found the EU Reference Scenario 2016, but this is a baseline scenario.

Best wishes,
Tiziano

hi tiziano,
the scenarios that were used for various 2030 climate and energy targets beyond the 2016 baseline reference scenario are here:

in the negotiations on these targets, this data was then modified to reflect higher res cost reductions. some of this data is available in the non-paper at the bottom of the article here, though i think the full dataset is not available, as far as i’m aware

i just checked and actually there is also this report, which reflects the scenario for the 2030 res/ee targets that were actually negotiated

Hi Tiziano,
Do you know iiasa’s scneario explorer? IXMP Scenario Explorer developed by IIASA
Maybe that helps you find what your looking for

I’ve not worked with this information but Capros et al (2016) is used by the OSeMOSYS‑based OSeMBE European reference model.

Edit: I see now, also noted by the original poster.

References

Capros, P, A De Vita, N Tasios, P Siskos, M Kannavou, A Petropoulos, S Evangelopoulou, M Zampara, D Papadopoulos, L Paroussos, K Fragiadakis, S Tsani, P Fragkos, N Kouvaritakis, L Höglund-Isaksson, W Winiwarter, P Purohit, A Gomez-Sanabria, S Frank, N Forsell, M Gusti, P Havlík, M Obersteiner, HP Witzke, and Monika Kesting (20 July 2016). EU reference scenario 2016: energy, transport and GHG emissions trends to 2050. Brussels, Belgium: European Commission.

Some further references related to the IPCC SR15 special report scenarios. These scenarios are public but not open. Nor are they specific to Europe.

References

Huppmann, Daniel, Elmar Kriegler, Volker Krey, Keywan Riahi, Joeri Rogelj, Steven K Rose, John Weyant, Nico Bauer, Christoph Bertram, Valentina Bosetti, Katherine Calvin, Jonathan Doelman, Laurent Drouet, Johannes Emmerling, Stefan Frank, Shinichiro Fujimori, David Gernaat, Arnulf Grubler, Celine Guivarch, Martin Haigh, Christian Holz, Gokul Iyer, Etsushi Kato, Kimon Keramidas, and Alban Kitous (2018). IAMC 1.5°C Scenario Explorer and Data hosted by IIASA. Integrated Assessment Modeling Consortium (IAMC) and International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA). doi:10.22022/SR15/08-2018.15429.

Huppmann, Daniel, Joeri Rogelj, Elmar Kriegler, Volker Krey, and Keywan Riahi (15 October 2018). “A new scenario resource for integrated 1.5 °C research”. Nature Climate Change. ISSN 1758-6798. doi:10.1038/s41558-018-0317-4.

IAMC (ongoing). IAMC 1.5°C Scenario Explorer hosted by IIASA. Integrated Assessment Modeling Consortium (IAMC). Part of the IPCC SR15 report.

IPCC (2018). Global warming of 1.5ºC. IPCC. Landing page. Published 8 October 2018.

Masson-Delmotte, Valérie, Panmao Zhai, Hans-Otto Pörtner, Debra Roberts, Jim Skea, Priyadarshi R Shukla, Anna Pirani, Wilfran Moufouma-Okia, Clotilde Péan, Roz Pidcock, Sarah Connors, JB Robin Matthews, Yang Chen, Xiao Zhou, Melissa I Gomis, Elisabeth Lonnoy, Tom Maycock, Melinda Tignor, and Tim Waterfield (editors) (2018). Global Warming of 1.5°C. An IPCC Special Report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty. Geneva, Switzerland: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Rogelj, Joeri, Drew Shindell, Kejun Jiang, Solomone Fifita, Piers Forster, Veronika Ginzburg, Collins Handa, Haroon Kheshgi, Shigeki Kobayashi, Elmar Kriegler, Luis Mundaca, Roland Séférian, and Maria Virginia Vilariño (October 2018). Chapter 2: Mitigation pathways compatible with 1.5°C in the context of sustainable development. In: Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C (SR15). Geneva, Switzerland: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Hi Arjun,

Thank you for these links!
Do you think that these EUCO scenarios are reasonable?

Hi Kat,

No, I didn’t know about it, thank you!

Thanks Robbie, they’ll be useful to me as a background later on.

Social storylines

Modelers wishing to more explicitly include social processes in their scenarios might like to look at the QTDIAN toolbox from the IASS in Potsdam, Germany. Here is a mid‑2021 post on the toolbox:

And this is the associated report:

SĂĽsser, Diana, Housam al Rakouki, and Johan Lilliestam (June 2021). The QTDIAN modelling toolbox–quantification of social drivers and constraints of the diffusion of energy technologies. Deliverable 2.3. Sustainable Energy Transitions Laboratory (SENTINEL) project. Potsdam, Germany: Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS). doi:10.48481/iass.2021.015. Covers version 1 of the toolbox.

This report contributes to the modelling work in SENTINEL and beyond in two main ways. First, we provide three social storylines that are closely linked to different governance logics and build on observed social and political drivers and barriers in the European energy transition. This is different than most other storylines used for modelling, because ours are based on governance patterns and normative assumptions of a “good future”, and not on the more common geopolitical or techno-economic storyline assumptions. Second, we provide quantitative, empirical data for several important social/political parameters that can be used together with the storylines or as separate building blocks to answer specific research questions with energy models.

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Hi Tiziano,
Check out our SENTINEL Deliverable which includes also specifications for our European case study: Case specification and scheduling. Deliverable 7.1. Sustainable Energy Transitions Laboratory (SENTINEL) project | Zenodo (Section 3.3).
Best! Diana

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Check out the decarbonization scenarios generated in the openENTRANCE project and available under CC-BY via the openENTRANCE Scenario Explorer hosted by IIASA at https://data.ece.iiasa.ac.at/openentrance

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