Building a national integrated model to explore overshoot pathways
Abstract
As the temperature limits of the Paris Agreement are breached a period of drawdown, net-negative emissions, will be required to correct overshoot. Drawdown pathways, that capture increasingly pressured interactions across energy, food and land systems where reductions, balancing residual emissions with removals and removals to correct overshoot will be required at country level to aid in the development of policy and strategy that extend to mid-century and beyond. We are developing a country-level integrated assessment model (energy, food and land systems) to examine the powerful levers from across these systems that can directly and indirectly affect carbon dioxide removal particularly the level of removals required mid-century and beyond e.g. immediate reductions of methane emissions to slow near-term warming, reducing reliance on removals to correct overshoot in the long-term. Our integrated model brings together the TIMES Ireland Model with agricultural and land-use systems, allowing us to explore the connections between these systems. We have developed key modules covering livestock and crop systems, as well as forestry, all within the constraints of national land availability. Under a business-as-usual scenario to 2070 methane emissions from ruminant agriculture remain a major source of GHG emissions in Ireland. Preliminary findings reveal there is significant potential to reduce methane emissions while freeing up land for other uses, such as forestry or bioenergy. This integrated approach provides new insights into how emissions abatement can influence land use dynamics and optimize long-term mitigation strategies across multiple sectors. Unlike traditional sectoral models, our framework captures the synergies and trade-offs between land, energy, and food systems, offering a more holistic understanding of how to balance emissions reductions and removals. We aim to present the outcomes of mitigation pathways related to agricultural, including methane technologies and demand-side reductions to demonstrate the potential of methane as a mitigation lever.