Energy and climate policy with the GCAM model: Assessing energy sources and technology options

Abstract

This paper aims at applying energy and climate policies with the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM) model, towards assessing energy sources and technology options. Towards reducing emissions, the model is used to apply top-down climate policy, implementing the Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs), as well as to apply bottom-up energy policies, implementing measures for the power and transport sector. The top-down climate policy enables the examination of ambitious emission reduction scenarios, such as the “RCP 2.0” and “RCP1.0” pathways, identifying that the energy mix shift towards environmentally friendly technologies is not adequate. The penetration of innovative technology options absorbing emissions is needed, especially beyond 2050, where major negative emissions are required to meet ambitious targets. Detailed energy balance flows, through the provision of Sankey diagrams, show the required changes from top-down perspective. The bottom-up energy policy perspective enables the formation of specific realistic scenarios in the different subsectors, such as the power and transport sectors, providing insights on the required policy changes on different energy sources and technology options, such as renewables and electric vehicles. Although our analysis does not provide a direct detailed comparison among the two approaches, both approaches provide clear message on the penetration of electric vehicles, the renewables but as well the need for carbon capture technologies in the long-term.