The PM Group focusses on solving immediate and near-term environmental (health and ecosystems impacts from pollution), climate (non-CO2 greenhouse gases), and social (widening inequality gaps) problems in a cost-effective way, providing support to policymaking at local and regional scales.
The PM Group addresses sustainability challenges in the near and long term through an improved understanding of the multiple benefits of policies and their distribution across society. The group has a strong focus on the development of new approaches for multi-sectoral policy interventions to manage pollution across different media (air, water, and soil) at various scales to address near-term concerns and enable long-term transformations and their public support towards a sustainable future. In particular, the group endeavors to enhance the systems perspective approach to address and explore issues such as the interactions and environmental impacts of pollution; assessment of sources of non-CO2 greenhouse gases; mitigation opportunities; approaches to address nutrient and material cycling; options for more equitable solutions; and improved methods for estimating the health and economic benefits of policy interventions.
Projects
Finding solutions to pollution caused by shipping in Europe (EMERGE)
Development of a global integrated assessment modeling system for climate-air pollutants management focused on Northeast Asia (GUIDE)
Development of a collaborative, integrated management framework to improve future air quality in Northeast Asia (AQNEA)
Exploring National and Global Actions to reduce Greenhouse gas Emissions (ENGAGE)
Staff
Jens Borken-Kleefeld
Senior Research Scholar (PM)
Wolfgang Schöpp
Guest Senior Research Scholar (PM)
Peter Rafaj
Senior Research Scholar (PM, IACC)
Keywan Riahi
Program Director and Principal Research Scholar (ECE); Principal Research Scholar (IACC, PM, S3, TISS)
News
16 November 2022
The need for rapid methane mitigation
Human-driven methane emissions account for nearly 45% of current net warming. The Global Methane Assessment 2030 baseline report, issued by the Climate and Clean Air Coalition and coauthored by IIASA researcher Lena Höglund-Isaksson, evaluates the progress of global reduction efforts. If the world is to keep global temperature rise below 1.5° and 2°C targets, swift action is needed.
15 November 2022
IIASA researchers once again among the world’s most highly cited
IIASA is proud to announce that 11 researchers from across various IIASA programs have been named on the 2022 Highly Cited Researchers™ list from Clarivate.
16 August 2022
Propane — a solution for more sustainable air conditioning
Current severe heatwaves that will likely increase in severity and frequency in the future are driving a rise in the use of air conditioners, threatening the environment with their high energy consumption and refrigerants with high warming potential. A new study finds that switching to propane as a refrigerant could lessen the global temperature increase from space cooling.
Focus
28 November 2022
Improving energy efficiency in Latin America’s dairy sector
Options Magazine, Winter 2022: A new study provides ways to combine efficient energy solutions with comprehensive waste management to make the Latin American dairy sector more sustainable.
24 November 2022
Charting fair pathways to climate neutrality
Options Magazine, Winter 2022: Equitably sharing the costs of mitigation is vital to ensure a just transition to a net-zero world. By calculating the impact of national policies on global emissions and exploring different effort-sharing schemes, the ENGAGE Project is at the forefront of developing feasible solutions.
12 October 2022
Targeting methane
Countries are coming together to try and control this elusive greenhouse gas, with the help of IIASA research.
Publications
Jiang, H.-D., Purohit, P. , Liang, Q.-M., Liu, L.-J., & Zhang, Y.-F. (2023). Improving the regional deployment of carbon mitigation efforts by incorporating air-quality co-benefits: A multi-provincial analysis of China. Ecological Economics 204 e107675. 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2022.107675.
Monteith, D.T., Henrys, P.A., Hruska, J., de Wit, H.A., Kram, P., Moldan, F., Posch, M. , Raike, A., Stoddard, J.L., Shilland, E.M., Pereira, M., & Evans, C.D. (2023). Long-term rise in riverine dissolved organic carbon concentration is predicted by electrolyte solubility theory. Science Advances 9 (3) eade3491. 10.1126/sciadv.ade3491.
Gu, B., Zhang, X., Lam, S.K., Yu, Y., van Grinsven, H.J.M., Zhang, S. , Wang, X., Bodirsky, B.L., Wang, S., Duan, J., Ren, C., Bouwman, L., de Vries, W., Xu, J., Sutton, M.A., & Chen, D. (2023). Cost-effective mitigation of nitrogen pollution from global croplands. Nature 613 (7942) 77-84. 10.1038/s41586-022-05481-8.
Chong, H., Lee, S., Cho, Y., Kim, J., Koo, J.-H., Pyo Kim, Y., Kim, Y. , Woo, J.-H., & Hyun Ahn, D. (2023). Assessment of air quality in North Korea from satellite observations. Environment International 171 e107708. 10.1016/j.envint.2022.107708.
Cai, W., Zhang, C., Zhang, S., Bai, Y., Callaghan, M., Chang, N., Chen, B., Chen, H., Cheng, L., Cui, X., Dai, H., Danna, B., Dong, W., Fan, W., Fang, X., Gao, T., Geng, Y., Guan, D., Hu, Y., Hua, J., Huang, C., Huang, H., Huang, J., Jiang, L., Jiang, Q., Jiang, X., Jin, H., Kiesewetter, G. , Liang, L., Lin, B., Lin, H., Liu, H., Liu, Q., Liu, T., Liu, X., Liu, X., Liu, Z., Liu, Z., Lou, S., Lu, C., Luo, Z., Meng, W., Miao, H., Ren, C., Romanello, M., Schöpp, W. , Su, J., Tang, X., Wang, C., Wang, Q., Warnecke, L. , Wen, S., Winiwarter, W. , Xie, Y., Xu, B., Yan, Y., Yang, X., Yao, F., Yu, L., Yuan, J., Zeng, Y., Zhang, J., Zhang, L., Zhang, R., Zhang, S., Zhang, S. , Zhao, Q., Zheng, D., Zhou, H., Zhou, J., Fung, M., Luo, Y., & Gong, P. (2022). The 2022 China report of the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change: leveraging climate actions for healthy ageing. The Lancet Public Health 7 (12) e1073-e1090. 10.1016/S2468-2667(22)00224-9.
