Call for scenario data contributions (closed)

The European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change invites the wider research community to submit emissions scenario data that can support its work in advising the EU on policy measures, climate targets and greenhouse gas budgets.

UPDATE (23.02.2023): The call for scenarios is now closed. The Advisory Board is grateful to the members of the research community who provided scenarios in response to this call. The Emissions scenario database of the European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change, is available here.

The European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change

The European Climate Law sets out a binding objective of climate neutrality in the European Union by 2050 in pursuit of the long-term temperature goal set out in the Paris Agreement. It also provides a framework for achieving progress in pursuit of the global adaptation goal established in the Paris Agreement.

To support the achievement of these objectives, the European Climate Law established a European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change to serve as a point of reference for the European Union on scientific knowledge relating to climate change. The Advisory Board provides independent scientific advice and produces reports on EU measures, climate targets and indicative greenhouse gas budgets and their coherence with the European Climate Law and the EU's international commitments under the Paris Agreement.

One of the Advisory Board's key priorities is to support the definition of a science-based EU greenhouse gas budget for the period 2030-2050 and greenhouse gas target for 2040, aligned with the EU’s 2050 climate neutrality objective and its commitments under the Paris Agreement.

In January 2023, the Advisory Board published initial recommendations to the European Commission on how to ensure the approach to set EU climate targets is systematic, transparent and guided by EU values. This initial input will be followed by a quantitative advice within the first half of 2023, before the Commission finalises its proposal.

See more information about the Advisory Board here.

Request for Emissions Scenario Data

This call is addressed towards research institutions and modelling teams, with a view to collect data of European and national (EU Member State) greenhouse gas emission scenarios to support the Advisory Board in its task to provide advice on targets and indicative budgets for EU greenhouse gas emissions in the 2030-2050 period and to support the assessment of progress towards the objectives of the European Climate Law.

The submitted scenarios will be collated in an emissions scenario database, making use of database infrastructure and a scenario explorer provided by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA). Those who submit scenarios retain full rights on their own use and sharing of their scenario data. In addition, they give the Advisory Board the right to use their data for the purpose of conducting the above-mentioned activities and to publish the data in a publicly available online database. The data will remain strictly confidential until the release of the first output by the Advisory Board and the accompanying publication of the online database, which is expected to be late 2022.

The Advisory Board will make use of all available literature, including literature beyond the scenarios in the compiled ensemble, to ensure that the final input is also guided by a wider range of considerations and literature. Collecting a wide range of scenarios will be, however, critically important to broaden insights on uncertainty ranges and related policy choices. The scenarios will be subject to a vetting process by the Advisory Board. While all submissions to the database will be considered, there is no guarantee that a particular scenario will be included in the Advisory Board output.

As the Advisory Board intends to make use of the widest possible selection of the emissions scenario literature in its assessments, you are invited to share this request with all parties you are aware of that have been working on model-based emissions scenarios relevant to the EU.

What to submit?

The Advisory Board is actively seeking information from the following types of scenarios:

scenarios with a comprehensive and integrated systems perspective, projecting emissions trajectories at EU (preferably EU-27) and/or Member State level up to 2050 (or beyond) consistent with:

meeting the EU goal of achieving climate neutrality by 2050;
depicting systems changes and emissions of current policies or nationally determined contributions (NDCs);
exploring synergies and trade-offs of climate policies with other societal goals, such as the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs);
placing EU emissions in a global context (e.g., multi-region scenarios consistent with keeping global warming below 2°C or 1.5°C);

scenarios providing a detailed sectoral perspective on how to reduce emissions in specific sectors (e.g., industry, mobility, buildings, or agricultural sector).

direct pairs of limiting scenarios and baselines / policy trend extrapolations

Scenarios should constitute an emissions trajectory over time with underlying socio-economic development until at least the year 2050 generated by a formal model (for example, dynamic systems, energy-economy, partial or general equilibrium or integrated assessment models).

Eligibility for submission

The criteria for inclusion of scenarios in the database are the following:

Time coverage: the scenario needs to run at least until the year 2050 (ideally 2100), and be developed by a formal model (see above).
Metadata: A minimum set of model and scenario meta information needs to be submitted (see below).
Publication: The scenario needs to be part of an existing publication in a peer-reviewed journal, or a submission for publication. Alternatively, the scenario has to be part of an existing or planned report determined by the Advisory Board to be eligible grey literature. Such determination is made on a case-by-case basis.
Terms of use: Scenario authors have accepted the terms of use of the database.

Terms of submission

Scenario authors retain full rights on their own sharing and use of their scenario data. Those rights will not be affected by submission, use and (where applicable) publication of their data in reports and underlying scenario databases of the Advisory Board.
By submitting scenario data, scenario authors transfer to the Advisory Board members and its secretariat the right to use their data for the purpose of informing reports and underlying databases to be published by the Advisory Board. The Advisory Board and its secretariat remain under the obligation to keep submitted preliminary and unpublished data strictly confidential.

How to submit?

A scenario contribution requires:

A contact email address of the owner of the submitted scenario data.
Registration of the underlying model version including model meta information at the database and registration of authorized users for scenario submission (see link below for details).
Submission of scenario data in the common scenario reporting template used in previous calls for scenarios relevant to the IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report (see link below for details). The template includes a large number of variables. Variables with high priority for the Advisory Board are indicated as Tier 1 and Tier 2.
Researchers are encouraged to submit as many variables with as much regional resolution as possible, because any material in the database could become relevant for the assessment by the Advisory Board.
More information on the submission process, model registration and the scenario reporting template, including a detailed explanation of reporting variables, can be found on the about page at: https://data.ece.iiasa.ac.at/eu-climate-advisory-board-submission

Thank you for your consideration of this request for emissions scenario data. The members of the Advisory Board will greatly appreciate your willingness to share your emissions pathway scenario data with them./

The Advisory Board anticipates that it will continue making use of scenario data over the next years to inform future work. This call for contributions may therefore be followed by further calls in relation to the Advisory Board’s future work programmes. Future calls will be communicated on the Advisory Board’s forthcoming website (currently in construction).

Contact

Please contact the Secretariat to the Advisory Board for further questions concerning the scenario contribution process: secretariat.advisoryboard@eea.europa.eu