Joint IRENA – JRC Expert Workshop on “Benchmarking long-term scenario comparison studies for the clean energy transition”

Long-term energy scenarios (LTES) support policy debates, provide strategic insights to businesses, and as such mitigate uncertainty, risks and unnecessary costs for the society. At the national, regional and international level, a number of institutions have developed scenario comparison studies in an effort to benchmark the assumptions and results of such scenarios, to provide increased reliability on scenario outputs and to improve the robustness of insights for policy makers planning the evolution of the energy system.

In this context, the Knowledge for the Energy Union Unit of the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission published recently the study “Towards net-zero emissions in the EU energy system - Insights from scenarios in line with the 2030 and 2050 ambitions of the European Green Deal” and undertakes several activities that encompass the use and comparison of global and European energy scenarios for the energy transition. Also, IRENA is coordinating the CEM Campaign on “Long-term Scenarios (LTES) for the Energy Transition”, a platform to promote the improved use and development of scenarios, enable the exchange of best practices and facilitate work to strengthen and broaden their use in guiding the clean energy transition.

This workshop will gather experts from institutions that have carried out scenario comparisons in an effort to:

• 1. map the motivation, the focus and the methods of such studies
• 2. provide a platform to discuss a systematic and formalised approach to scenario comparison and to shed light on good practices
• 3. identify how scenario comparison results and insights can be used in policymaking within the clean energy transition

The virtual workshop will be conducted as follows:

• 1. Day 1 (Thursday, 10 September, 15:00 – 17:30 CET): Presentations on state-of-the-art LTES comparison studies
• 2. Day 2 (Friday, 11 September, 15:00 – 17:00 CET): Breakout group discussions with invited experts.

See the workshop concept note, agenda and further details on scenario comparison studies here (last updated: 24 June 2020).

Participation and Registration

Further details for participants wishing to attend this virtual event will be shared soon.

For more information please contact ltes@irena.org.