Climate neutrality scenarios

Climate neutrality scenarios explore different pathways for achieving net-zero and net-negative emissions and stabilising the global temperature. They consider potential transformations taking place in different sectors for the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.


A portfolio of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) options should be included in these scenarios in order to complement the emission reduction efforts, as well as account for any delays in climate policy implementation that could lead to a temperature overshoot beyond the Paris Agreement targets.

RESCUE works to investigate the scaling potential and develop a diverse portfolio of land- and ocean-based CDR options, building on previous work and outputs of projects such as LANDMARC and OceanNETs. This portfolio will be used to define a new set of climate neutrality scenarios until 2100 to be included in Earth System Models (ESMs). These scenarios provide assumptions on the future drivers of anthropogenic GHG emissions and short-lived climate forcers, as well as land-use changes.

The scenarios designed in RESCUE will cover several temperature targets with or without overshoot (including 1.5°C, 2°C and beyond), sectors (e.g. energy, agriculture, land use) and regions (spatially explicit emissions). These will be then applied and investigated further in the project.

Some of the aims of the research conducted on climate neutrality scenarios include:

  • Assess the main barriers and challenges that limit the technical scaling potential of CDR options in different regions.
  • Inform on the socioeconomic impacts of deploying CDR options and temperature overshoot.
  • Formulate narratives on diversified CDR scaling portfolios that are regionally and temporally viable, which can be included in Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs).
  • Conduct full and consistent harmonisation and gridding of the scenario data for use in ESMs.
  • Consolidate the REMIND-MAgPIE model to include all relevant CDR options, as well as use REMIND-MAgPIE and ACC2 models to develop extended emissions scenarios until 2300.