Making a clean break
The UCL Energy Institute’s UKTM energy model underpins UK’s Clean Growth Strategy.
Published on 12 October 2017, the Clean Growth Strategy sets out the UK government’s plan to “lead the way to a low carbon future”. It includes plans to cut emissions in buildings, transport, electricity and heating, and explores energy options to 2050 using the UK TIMES model (UKTM).
The UKTM was developed by the UCL-led research consortium wholeSEM and the UK Energy Research Centre, in partnership with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. It models the whole UK energy system to identify how the country might achieve an affordable low-carbon economy. In the Clean Growth Strategy, the model underpinned analysis of 2050 pathways.
The first objective of the analysis was to understand the range of possible long-term outcomes of three different economy-wide decarbonisation pathways. The second objective was to confirm that these pathways were consistent with the targets set by the fifth carbon budget and the 2050 emission reduction targets.
Dr Paul Dodds, Senior Lecturer at The Bartlett School of Energy, Environment and Resources, and developer of UKTM, says its use in the strategy is, “a great example of how UK energy modelling research can be used to inform important policy decisions, when carried out in an open and collaborative environment with appropriate quality assurance”.
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