Integrated Assessment Modelling for negotiations under the Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP)
European efforts to develop strategies to control air pollution require an understanding of a wide range of issues, including the movement of air pollution across national borders. A significant part of the scientific modeling behind those efforts comes from IIASA’s Mitigation of Air Pollution and Greenhouse Gases Program (MAG), primarily through use of the GAINS model. The GAINS model, and its predecessor, the RAINS model, have been applied to assist key policy negotiations on improving air quality throughout Europe.
Since 1999 IIASA has been hosting the Centre for Integrated Assessment Modelling (CIAM), one of the four centres assigned for the European Monitoring and Evaluation Programme (EMEP) of the Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution.
CIAM prepares technical background material for the annual meetings of the Task Force on Integrated Assessment Modelling (TFIAM). The Task Force brings together information gathered from the Parties and from other Convention bodies on cost-effective emission control strategies. Its regular reports to the negotiating bodies of the Convention assist - through computer models - in the development of legal instruments (protocols).
Those negotiations are ongoing and include:
- The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe’s Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP), which includes the ongoing revision of the Gothenburg Protocol to Abate Acidification, Eutrophication, and Ground-level Ozone.
- The European Union’s Acidification Strategy, the ongoing revision of the National Emission Ceilings Directive, the Clean Air for Europe Programme.