The European long-term strategy for a prosperous, equitable and climate-neutral economy by 2050 imposes an urgent energy transition in order to meet the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement. In consideration of the multifaceted nature of the energy transition, which could take advantage from the new approach of the EU policies towards its Member States, it is crucial to evaluate this process as comprehensively as possible, formulating feasible and sustainable policies at national level. This requires a set of innovative interconnected instruments, which allow tracking the technological feasibility of the transition process and its implications in terms of economic, social and environmental sustainability. At the same time, it is necessary to take account of the specificities at subnational level in consideration of the role that local features excite in shaping the overall process of energy transition. The proposed DEsigning SusTainable energy transItioN pathwaYs (DESTINY) project strives to respond to these evaluation needs by developing a novel integrated assessment modelling framework, which derives from the linkage of a series of models from different disciplines. The main objective of this undertaking is to provide a novel set of tools to design alternative energy transition paths and support the policy decisions to ensure the short and long-term sustainability. In this perspective, the project integrates and complements the engineering and the economic approaches into a unified and coherent multi-scale framework. Thus, compared to the existing integrated modelling approaches, it fully exploits interactions and feedbacks between energy and socio-economic systems, assessing multisectoral and multiregional economic and environmental impacts of transition pathways, including distributional aspects, financial sustainability of fiscal policies and well-being indicators. Specifically, the bottom-up energy system model determines the technically feasible, least-cost energy supply technology mixes over the planning horizon to satisfy a given energy demand. The micro-macro household demand modelling, which integrates demographic, financial and social variables will estimate, among other commodities, the final demand of energy services and will exchange these results with energy and macroeconomic models. A multiregional and multisectoral approach characterizes both the Stock Flow Consistent model and the dynamic CGE model, both integrated with environmental and well-being indicators. These models allow quantifying the changes in production processes, activated by the adjustment in the final demand composition and by policies set by the policy maker to support the transition process. This modelling framework in which all models share data and results will provide a sound support to the central and local policy makers in selecting the most effective policy measures to support the energy transition process in a context of socio-economic sustainability.
DEsigning SusTainable energy transItioN pathwaYs (DESTINY): a multi-scale integrated modelling framework
Claudio Socci;Marcello Signorelli;Francesca Severini;Amin Ullah;Rossella Bardazzi;
2021-01-01
Abstract
The European long-term strategy for a prosperous, equitable and climate-neutral economy by 2050 imposes an urgent energy transition in order to meet the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement. In consideration of the multifaceted nature of the energy transition, which could take advantage from the new approach of the EU policies towards its Member States, it is crucial to evaluate this process as comprehensively as possible, formulating feasible and sustainable policies at national level. This requires a set of innovative interconnected instruments, which allow tracking the technological feasibility of the transition process and its implications in terms of economic, social and environmental sustainability. At the same time, it is necessary to take account of the specificities at subnational level in consideration of the role that local features excite in shaping the overall process of energy transition. The proposed DEsigning SusTainable energy transItioN pathwaYs (DESTINY) project strives to respond to these evaluation needs by developing a novel integrated assessment modelling framework, which derives from the linkage of a series of models from different disciplines. The main objective of this undertaking is to provide a novel set of tools to design alternative energy transition paths and support the policy decisions to ensure the short and long-term sustainability. In this perspective, the project integrates and complements the engineering and the economic approaches into a unified and coherent multi-scale framework. Thus, compared to the existing integrated modelling approaches, it fully exploits interactions and feedbacks between energy and socio-economic systems, assessing multisectoral and multiregional economic and environmental impacts of transition pathways, including distributional aspects, financial sustainability of fiscal policies and well-being indicators. Specifically, the bottom-up energy system model determines the technically feasible, least-cost energy supply technology mixes over the planning horizon to satisfy a given energy demand. The micro-macro household demand modelling, which integrates demographic, financial and social variables will estimate, among other commodities, the final demand of energy services and will exchange these results with energy and macroeconomic models. A multiregional and multisectoral approach characterizes both the Stock Flow Consistent model and the dynamic CGE model, both integrated with environmental and well-being indicators. These models allow quantifying the changes in production processes, activated by the adjustment in the final demand composition and by policies set by the policy maker to support the transition process. This modelling framework in which all models share data and results will provide a sound support to the central and local policy makers in selecting the most effective policy measures to support the energy transition process in a context of socio-economic sustainability.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
