The overarching goal of SET-Nav was to support strategic decision making in Europe’s energy sector, enhancing innovation towards a clean, secure and efficient energy system.
The SET-Nav project had three key objectives:
● To enhance modelling capacities to increase understanding of interactions and interdependencies between actors, technologies and policy interventions in Europe’s energy system.
● To provide model-based decision support for enhancing energy innovation towards a clean, secure and efficient energy system – through strategic policy analyses tackling relevant technology and policy options, complemented by detailed comparative assessments of energy transformation pathways
● To ensure a proper research orientation and a high impact through a continuous and in-depth stakeholder involvement and dialogue
In order to achieve the above objectives various actions were completed throughout the project. These include: a strategic policy analysis, which encompassed a dual approach, combining detailed bottom‐up ‘case studies’ linked to SET Plan Key Actions & Priorities with holistic ‘transformation pathways’. Based on the lessons learnt from the case studies and using the full suite of modelling resources, independent analysis of pathways for a deep decarbonisation of Europe until 2050 was conducted. The drivers and scenario dimensions that affect the broad set of applicable decarbonisation options under distinct framework conditions were assessed.
Methodological tools used were quantitative analysis, modelling and analysis of pathways, soft-linking of models, case studies, policy analysis, stakeholder dialogue through events, workshops, and others.
The findings support the further development of the SET-Plan and its implementation by continuous stakeholder engagement. They offer a bandwidth of solutions as well as key insights alongside the SET‐Nav main modelling perspectives: demand side, energy supply and infrastructure, and the macroeconomic effects.
In conclusion, SET‐Nav recommends strengthening the following key priorities in the SETPlan:
– Directed innovation efforts within the SET Plan portfolio should be more balanced across the full portfolio of priority areas. Currently, the portfolio is weighted towards renewable energy, energy efficiency and sustainable transport. Greater consistency is also needed among the different innovation activities supported by the SET Plan to ensure the innovation system works effectively.
– Regarding the different sectors, the main priorities for further research and public support on the demand side are decentralised heat supply and heat pumps. Furthermore, to decarbonise industry, extending the ETS with a minimum price as well as expanding public RD&I funding are important measures.
– In terms of energy infrastructure, electricity network development for integrating new renewables generation is a prerequisite, as is preparing grids for the integration of large volumes of distributed energy resources and for new forms of energy storage. From the supply perspective, our analysis shows that direct electrification should be favoured wherever reasonable as it is more efficient and leads to fewer requirements on energy infrastructures.
– Efficient decarbonisation via direct or indirect electrification requires efficient linkages between the energy markets by monitoring close to real‐time carbon content of energy carriers and emissions.
CEPS led WP2 “Stakeholder Dialogue” with the aim of planning, coordinating and formalising the consortium process with the relevant stakeholders at policy, industry and expert level. CEPS organised five stakeholder workshops: one opening, three thematic workshops and a closing workshop to present the outcomes of the overall assessment.
