Integrate health into decision-making to foster climate action

The COVID-19 pandemic reveals that societies place a high value on healthy lives. Leveraging this momentum to establish a more central role for human health in the policy process will provide further impetus to a sustainable transformation of energy and food systems

Das Kopernikus-Projekt ENavi - Die Transformation des Stromsystems mit Fokus Kohleausstieg

In diesem Bericht wird die Transformation des Stromsystems als zentrale Stellschraube zur Erreichung der Klimaziele analysiert. Dabei wird die Dekarbonisierung, insbesondere der Ausstieg aus der Kohleverstromung, in den Fokus gerückt. Anhand einer systematischen Vorgehensweise werden Transformationsszenarien für das deutsche Energiesystem identifiziert, analysiert und bewertet. Die Analyse erfolgt mithilfe unterschiedlicher computergestützter Modelle, um die Auswirkungen im gesamten System abschätzen zu können. Es werden sowohl Wechselwirkungen im Stromsystem und im Energiesystem, als auch im Wirtschaftssystem und im Bereich Ressourcen und Umwelt untersucht

REMIND2.1: transformation and innovation dynamics of the energy-economic system within climate and sustainability limits

This paper presents the new and now open-source version 2.1 of the REgional Model of INvestments and Development (REMIND). REMIND, as an integrated assessment model (IAM), provides an integrated view of the global energy–economy–emissions system and explores self-consistent transformation pathways. It describes a broad range of possible futures and their relation to technical and socio-economic developments as well as policy choices. REMIND is a multiregional model incorporating the economy and a detailed representation of the energy sector implemented in the General Algebraic Modeling System (GAMS). It uses non-linear optimization to derive welfare-optimal regional transformation pathways of the energy-economic system subject to climate and sustainability constraints for the time horizon from 2005 to 2100. The resulting solution corresponds to the decentralized market outcome under the assumptions of perfect foresight of agents and internalization of external effects. REMIND enables the analyses of technology options and policy approaches for climate change mitigation with particular strength in representing the scale-up of new technologies, including renewables and their integration in power markets. The REMIND code is organized into modules that gather code relevant for specific topics. Interaction between different modules is made explicit via clearly defined sets of input and output variables. Each module can be represented by different realizations, enabling flexible configuration and extension. The spatial resolution of REMIND is flexible and depends on the resolution of the input data. Thus, the framework can be used for a variety of applications in a customized form, balancing requirements for detail and overall runtime and complexity

Deutschland auf dem Weg zur Klimaneutralität 2045 - Szenarien und Pfade im Modellvergleich (Zusammenfassung)

Erstmals stellt die vorliegende Szenarienanalyse für Deutschland konkreteTransformationspfade zur Klimaneutralität 2045 auf der Basis eines umfassenden Modellvergleichs vor. Das Besondere an dieser Studie des Ariadne-Projektes ist, dass sechs Gesamtsystem- und Sek-tormodelle in einer Studie integriert wurden, die sich in ihren jeweiligen Stärken ergänzen: Für spezifische Fragestellungen wurde jeweils dasjenige Modell als Leitmodell hervorgehoben, welches die entsprechenden Aspekte am genauesten abbildet. Weitere Modelle wurden genutzt, um Auswirkungen der Transformation auf Umweltschutzgüter und die Verteilung der Kosten auf verschiedene Einkommensgruppen zu analysieren.Dieser breit gefächerte Ansatz ermöglicht es, die Implikationen der Energiewende robust und im Detail zu beschreiben

Brownian motors: noisy transport far from equilibrium

Transport phenomena in spatially periodic systems far from thermal equilibrium are considered. The main emphasize is put on directed transport in so-called Brownian motors (ratchets), i.e. a dissipative dynamics in the presence of thermal noise and some prototypical perturbation that drives the system out of equilibrium without introducing a priori an obvious bias into one or the other direction of motion. Symmetry conditions for the appearance (or not) of directed current, its inversion upon variation of certain parameters, and quantitative theoretical predictions for specific models are reviewed as well as a wide variety of experimental realizations and biological applications, especially the modeling of molecular motors. Extensions include quantum mechanical and collective effects, Hamiltonian ratchets, the influence of spatial disorder, and diffusive transport.Comment: Revised version (Aug. 2001), accepted for publication in Physics Report

Umweltfolgenabschätzung in Energie-Wirtschaft-Klima-Modellen

Climate change is one of, if not the, most important issues faced by the global society in the 21st century. The effects of climate change are visible on all continents and oceans already today and a business-as-usual will lead to severe consequences on the earth system, the economy and public health. Keeping these risks in check, the international community signed the Paris Agreement, stating the goal to limit the global mean temperature rise at the end of the century to well below 2 \degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5\degree C. This is one of the first incidents of human kind acknowledging that the current development is not sustainable and the earth's limits would be reached in a time span of a few generation. Achieving the Paris Agreement goals requires greenhouse gas emission net neutrality around mid century, implying a limited remaining greenhouse gas emission budget. This necessitates an unprecedented transformation of the energy system, land-use sector and, if economic development and energy demand are not decoupled, deprioritization of economic growth. However, the remaining emission budget is currently over-exploited by countries acting independently according to their own self-interest, free-riding on the mitigation efforts of the others, a case of the Tragedy of the Global Commons. In this context, climate change has also been called the biggest market failure since the emitters of greenhouse gases seldom face the associated cost. In the absence of a price reflecting climate change impacts, climate policies are required. Policymakers establish policies to achieve the transformation, crucially informed by scenarios from integrated energy-economy-climate models. The common approach is to model economically optimal scenarios while constraining greenhouse gas emissions to meet a set radiative forcing target. This transformation intersects with other sustainability goals which can lead to positive, called co-benefits, or negative effects, called adverse side effects. However, the common approach lacks accounting for other co-benefits and adverse side effects associated with the infrastructure and the operation of the energy system. These include air pollution - public health effects, water–energy–land nexus and biodiversity conservation. Consequently, for a holistic sustainability assessment it is necessary to endeavour beyond an isolated consideration of greenhouse gas emissions as the unique metric. The research question this dissertation is tackling is therefore: What are the co-benefits and adverse side effects of energy and climate policy? The three main chapters assess this topic with different foci. The first chapter focuses on the specific consideration of one of the most important externality of the energy system, air pollution induced public health effects. In the second chapter a comprehensive life cycle based assessment of impacts for a subsystem, the electricity system in Germany, is performed. Here, the sustainability dimension is evaluated against the economic cost through a multi criteria optimization. Finally we do a comprehensive analysis of different global climate policy scenarios with the focus on the policy of a global coal exit. Our main result is that the co-benefits of climate policy are in the same order of magnitude as the mitigation cost, if a comprehensive analysis is applied, confirming its relevance. Especially major emitters of greenhouse gas emissions such as India and China benefit the most from climate mitigation efforts, this can function as an early entry point for climate mitigation policies. In contrast to climate policies the human health and environmental co-benefits are local and intra-generational. This can help tackle the described Tragedy of the Global Commons of climate mitigation. We show that renewable energies not only emit the lowest greenhouse gases they also outperform fossil fuel based technologies on most of the other sustainability criteria. However, our results show that the co-benefits consideration needs to be comprehensive as climate policies can lead to challenges for example in land-use and resource depletion that need further attention. We further show that including the whole life cycle and a system wide analysis are crucial as impacts are shifted from direct to indirect emissions and unintended substitution effects need to be accounted for. Finally we give an outlook for future research directions which should mainly focus on a more detailed modeling of environmental and human health impacts as well as the question on how to integrate the impact assessment into the modeling of transition pathways.Der Klimawandel ist eine der, wenn nicht gar die wichtigste Herausforderung der Menschheit im 21. Jahrhundert. Die Auswirkungen des Klimawandels sind auf allen Kontinenten und Ozeanen bereits heute sichtbar und ein weiter wie bisher hätte schwerwiegenden Folgen für die Umwelt, Wirtschaft und öffentliche Gesundheit. Um diese Risiken in Schach zu halten, unterzeichnete die internationale Gemeinschaft das Pariser Übereinkommen, in dem sie sich darauf einigte, den globalen Anstieg der mittleren Temperatur bis zum Ende des Jahrhunderts auf deutlich unter 2◦Celsius über dem vorindustriellen Niveau zu begrenzen und Anstrengungen zu unternehmen, um ihn auf 1,5◦C zu begrenzen. Dies ist einer der ersten Ereignisse in der die Menschheit anererkennt, dass die gegenwärtige Entwicklung nicht nachhaltig ist und die Grenzen der Erde in einer Zeitspanne von wenigen Generationen erreicht werden würden. Um die Pariser Ziele zu erreichen, muss um die Mitte des Jahrhunderts netto Neutralität von Treibhausgasen erreicht werden was ein verbleibendes Emissionsbudget impliziert. Dies erfordert eine beispiellose Transformation des Energiesystems, des Landnutzungssektors und, wenn wirtschaftliche Entwicklung und Energienachfrage nicht entkoppelt werden, die Entpriorisierung vonWirtschaftswachstum. Das verbleibende Emissionsbudget wird derzeit von Ländern übermäßig ausgeschöpft, die nach ihrem eigenen Eigeninteresse handeln und von Minderungsbemühungen der anderen profitieren, ein Fall der Tragödie der Global Commons. Folglich wird der Klimawandel auch als das größte Marktversagen bezeichnet, da die Emittenten von Treibhausgasen selten mit den damit verbundenen Kosten konfrontiert sind. Dem Marktversagen zu begegnen erfordert das Eingreifen der Politik. Die politischen Entscheidungsträger legen dazu Maßnahmen fest, die auf detaillierten Abschätzungen ihrer Auswirkungen basieren. Dabei werden sie durch Szenarienanalysen von Integrated Assessment und Energiesystemmodellen informiert. Der gängige Ansatz besteht darin, wirtschaftlich optimale Szenarien zu modellieren und gleichzeitig die Treibhausgasemissionen zu begrenzen, um ein festgelegtes Erwärmungsziel zu erreichen. Die Dekarbonisierung unseres Wirtschaftens überschneidet sich aber mit einer Vielzahl anderen Nachhaltigkeitszielen, was zu Zusatznutzen oder negativen Effekten führen kann. Dem gängigen Ansatz fehlt es jedoch an der Berücksichtigung dieser Zusatznutzen und Nebenwirkungen im Zusammenhang mit der Infrastruktur und dem Betrieb des Energiesystems. Dazu gehören unter anderem die durch Luftverschmutzung verursachten Auswirkungen auf die öffentliche Gesundheit, der Nexus zwischenWasser, Energie und Land und der Schutz der biologischen Vielfalt. Für eine ganzheitliche Nachhaltigkeitsbewertung ist es daher notwendig, über eine isolierte Betrachtung der Treibhausgasemissionen als alleinige Kennzahl hinauszugehen. Die Forschungsfrage, der sich diese Dissertation widmet, ist daher: Was sind die Zusatznutzen und negativen Effekte von Energie- und Klimapolitik? Die drei Hauptkapitel beleuchten diese Themenfeld mit unterschiedlichen Schwerpunkten. Das zweite Kapitel konzentriert sich auf die spezifische Berücksichtigung einer der wichtigsten Externalität des Energiesystems, durch Luftverschmutzung induzierte Auswirkungen auf die öffentliche Gesundheit. Im dritten Kapitel wird eine umfassende lebenszyklusbasierte Bewertung der Auswirkungen für ein Subsystem, das Elektrizitätssystem in Deutschland, durchgeführt. Die Nachhaltigkeitsdimension wird hierbei durch eine multikriterielle Optimierung mit den wirtschaftlichen Kosten verglichen. Schließlich führen wir eine umfassende Analyse verschiedener globaler klimapolitischer Szenarien durch, wobei der Schwerpunkt auf der Politik eines globalen Kohleausstiegs liegt. Unser Hauptergebnis ist, dass die Zusatznutzen der Klimapolitik bei einer umfassende Analyse in der gleichen Größenordnung liegen wie die Minderungskosten. Vor allem große Emittenten von Treibhausgasemissionen wie Indien und China profitieren am meisten von den Bemühungen um den Klimaschutz, dies kann als früher Einstieg in Klimaschutzpolitik dienen. Im Gegensatz zur Klimapolitik sind die Vorteile für die menschliche Gesundheit und die Umwelt lokal und zeitnah. Dies kann dazu beitragen, die beschriebene Tragödie der Global Commons von Klimapolitik zu bewältigen. Wir zeigen weiter, dass erneuerbare Energien nicht nur die niedrigsten Treibhausgasemissionen ausstoßen, sondern auch einen geringere Auswirkung auf die meisten anderen Nachhaltigkeitskriterien als auf fossilen Brennstoffen basierenden Technologien haben. Unsere Ergebnisse zeigen jedoch, dass die Betrachtung der Zusatznutzen umfassend sein muss, da Klimapolitik zu Herausforderungen zum Beispiel bei der Landnutzung und der Ressourcenverknappung führen kann, die weitere Aufmerksamkeit erfordern. Wir zeigen ferner, dass die Einbeziehung des gesamten Lebenszyklus und eine systemweite Analyse entscheidend sind, da die Auswirkungen von direkten auf indirekte Emissionen verlagert werden und unbeabsichtigte Substitutionseffekte berücksichtigt werden müssen. Schließlich geben wir einen Ausblick auf zukünftige Forschungsfelder, die sich vor allem auf eine detaillierterere Modellierung der Auswirkungen auf die Umwelt und die menschliche Gesundheit sowie auf die Frage konzentrieren sollten, wie die Folgenabschätzung in die Modellierung von Transformationspfaden integriert werden kann

Holistic energy system modeling combining multi-objective optimization and life cycle assessment

Making the global energy system more sustainable has emerged as a major societal concern and policy objective. This transition comes with various challenges and opportunities for a sustainable evolution affecting most of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals. We therefore propose broadening the current metrics for sustainability in the energy system modeling field by using industrial ecology techniques to account for a conclusive set of indicators. This is pursued by including a life cycle based sustainability assessment into an energy system model considering all relevant products and processes of the global supply chain. We identify three pronounced features: (i) the low-hanging fruit of impact mitigation requiring manageable economic effort; (ii) embodied emissions of renewables cause increasing spatial redistribution of impact from direct emissions, the place of burning fuel, to indirect emissions, the location of the energy infrastructure production; (iii) certain impact categories, in which more overall sustainable systems perform worse than the cost minimal system, require a closer look. In essence, this study makes the case for future energy system modeling to include the increasingly important global supply chain and broaden the metrics of sustainability further than cost and climate change relevant emissions

Air quality co-benefits of ratcheting up the NDCs

The current nationally determined contributions, pledged by the countries under the Paris Agreement, are far from limiting climate change to below 2 ∘C temperature increase by the end of the century. The necessary ratcheting up of climate policy is projected to come with a wide array of additional benefits, in particular a reduction of today’s 4.5 million annual premature deaths due to poor air quality. This paper therefore addresses the question how climate policy and air pollution–related health impacts interplay until 2050 by developing a comprehensive global modeling framework along the cause and effect chain of air pollution–induced social costs. We find that ratcheting up climate policy to a 2 ∘ compliant pathway results in welfare benefits through reduced air pollution that are larger than mitigation costs, even with avoided climate change damages neglected. The regional analysis demonstrates that the 2 ∘C pathway is therefore, from a social cost perspective, a “no-regret option” in the global aggregate, but in particular for China and India due to high air quality benefits, and also for developed regions due to net negative mitigation costs. Energy and resource exporting regions, on the other hand, face higher mitigation cost than benefits. Our analysis further shows that the result of higher health benefits than mitigation costs is robust across various air pollution control scenarios. However, although climate mitigation results in substantial air pollution emission reductions overall, we find significant remaining emissions in the transport and industry sectors even in a 2 ∘C world. We therefore call for further research in how to optimally exploit climate policy and air pollution control, deriving climate change mitigation pathways that maximize co-benefits

Air quality co-benefits of ratcheting up the NDCs

The current nationally determined contributions, pledged by the countries under the Paris Agreement, are far from limiting climate change to below 2 ∘C temperature increase by the end of the century. The necessary ratcheting up of climate policy is projected to come with a wide array of additional benefits, in particular a reduction of today’s 4.5 million annual premature deaths due to poor air quality. This paper therefore addresses the question how climate policy and air pollution–related health impacts interplay until 2050 by developing a comprehensive global modeling framework along the cause and effect chain of air pollution–induced social costs. We find that ratcheting up climate policy to a 2 ∘ compliant pathway results in welfare benefits through reduced air pollution that are larger than mitigation costs, even with avoided climate change damages neglected. The regional analysis demonstrates that the 2 ∘C pathway is therefore, from a social cost perspective, a “no-regret option” in the global aggregate, but in particular for China and India due to high air quality benefits, and also for developed regions due to net negative mitigation costs. Energy and resource exporting regions, on the other hand, face higher mitigation cost than benefits. Our analysis further shows that the result of higher health benefits than mitigation costs is robust across various air pollution control scenarios. However, although climate mitigation results in substantial air pollution emission reductions overall, we find significant remaining emissions in the transport and industry sectors even in a 2 ∘C world. We therefore call for further research in how to optimally exploit climate policy and air pollution control, deriving climate change mitigation pathways that maximize co-benefits.EC/H2020/730403/EU/Innovation pathways, strategies and policies for the Low-Carbon Transition in Europe/INNOPATH

Air quality co-benefits of ratcheting up the NDCs

The current nationally determined contributions, pledged by the countries under the Paris Agreement, are far from limiting climate change to below 2 ∘C temperature increase by the end of the century. The necessary ratcheting up of climate policy is projected to come with a wide array of additional benefits, in particular a reduction of today’s 4.5 million annual premature deaths due to poor air quality. This paper therefore addresses the question how climate policy and air pollution–related health impacts interplay until 2050 by developing a comprehensive global modeling framework along the cause and effect chain of air pollution–induced social costs. We find that ratcheting up climate policy to a 2 ∘ compliant pathway results in welfare benefits through reduced air pollution that are larger than mitigation costs, even with avoided climate change damages neglected. The regional analysis demonstrates that the 2 ∘C pathway is therefore, from a social cost perspective, a “no-regret option” in the global aggregate, but in particular for China and India due to high air quality benefits, and also for developed regions due to net negative mitigation costs. Energy and resource exporting regions, on the other hand, face higher mitigation cost than benefits. Our analysis further shows that the result of higher health benefits than mitigation costs is robust across various air pollution control scenarios. However, although climate mitigation results in substantial air pollution emission reductions overall, we find significant remaining emissions in the transport and industry sectors even in a 2 ∘C world. We therefore call for further research in how to optimally exploit climate policy and air pollution control, deriving climate change mitigation pathways that maximize co-benefits. © 2020, The Author(s)