Policy Applications

IIASA's AIR team uses advanced systems analysis to inform key policy processes and international negotiations on clean air and greenhouse gas mitigation. The multi-pollutant/multi-effect concept of the GAINS model and its predecessor, the RAINS model, has shaped the approach for advanced clean air and climate policies around the world.

The GAINS methodology identifies cost-effective portfolios of specific measures that improve local air quality and, at the same time, reduce global climate change. This focus on actions that yield co-benefits at different spatial and temporal scales, provides a fresh perspective to clean air and climate policy development in many countries and world regions. In particular, IIASA is contributing to the following policy processes:




European Union Air Quality and Climate policies

In 1995, the European Union adopted an integrated approach for developing its air quality and climate policy legislation, following the multi-pollutant/multi-effect concept of IIASA's RAINS and GAINS models. Since then, the European Commission derives their quantitative proposals for air and climate policies from cost-effectiveness analyses with IIASA's GAINS and RAINS models that balance emission reduction measures across different pollutants, economic sectors and Member States. More


Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP)

Since the mid 1980s, methodologies and modeling tools developed by IIASA have been applied as the analytical backbone for the negotiations on a series of protocols under the LRTAP Convention. The GAINS model and its predecessor, the RAINS model, provided the negotiators with an integrated perspective of the scientific knowledge that emerged from the scientific working groups and task forces of the LRTAP Convention. Since 1999, IIASA serves is officially designated as the 'Centre for Integrated Assessment Modelling' (CIAM) of the LRTAP Convention. More


Climate and Clean Air Coalition (CCAC)

In the '“Integrated Assessment of Black Carbon and Tropospheric Ozone” of UNEP and WMO, IIASA identified 16 practical measures that would improve human health, secure crop yields and, at the same time, reduce global temperature increase in the near-term by up to 0.5 degrees.

To initiate concrete action on these measures, US State Secretary Hillary Clinton launched a 'Climate and Clean Air Coalition' to Reduce Short Lived Climate Pollutants' in February 2012, complementing efforts on CO2 emissions taken by countries under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. By 2018 the Coalition was joined by more than 60 countries and 60 non-state partners. More


Arctic Council

The Arctic Council, a high-level intergovernmental forum to promote cooperation, coordination and interaction among the Arctic States, addresses inter alia critical issues of the Arctic environment and climate change. IIASA is regularly participating in scientific working groups and task forces of the Arctic Council and contributing to their reports. More


Pollution Management and Environmental Health (PMEH) in Developing Countries

With the Pollution Management and Environmental Health (PMEH) program of the World Bank, IIASA develops practical tools for air quality management planning in large urban areas in developing countries. More


UN Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

In the 2009 run-up for the COP15 Copenhagen Climate conference, IIASA developed an interactive tool tool for an impartial scientific assessment of efforts that are implied by various negotiation offers (pledges) of Parties. While actual negotiations did not reach a state where the comparability of mitigation efforts would become a critical issue, IIASA continued contributing to UNEP analyses of the emission gaps between pledges offered by Parties and the requirements for temperature stabilization. More


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Last edited: 23 April 2021

International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
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