Integrated assessment and energy-economy models are important tools for informing long-term global and regional climate mitigation strategies. Sound policy advice requires improved representations of complex system interactions and thorough validation of model behavior in order to increase confidence in climate policy assessments. With the increasing use and growth in complexity of the models, the demand for improved representations has grown significantly over the past years.

To fill this gap, the ‘ADVANCE’ project aims to trigger the development of a new generation of models. ADVANCE stands for Advanced Model Development and Validation for the Improved Analysis of Costs and Impacts of Mitigation Policies. The project is working on key areas in which model improvements are most needed, including end use and energy service demand, representation of consumer heterogeneity, preferences and behavior, and technical change and uncertainty.

The ADVANCE project is led by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, and has 14 institutional partners including the Tyndall Centre. The Tyndall Centre’s research is focused on empirical analysis of the behavioural influences on energy use.

Contact
Charlie Wilson, Hazel Pettifor

Duration
January 2013 - December 2016

Funder
EU FP7

Other Information
http://www.fp7-advance.eu