Scenarios

This guide explains the role and functionality of scenario analysis within the Low Emissions Analysis Platform (LEAP), detailing how scenarios are used to model future energy systems and how data is managed through expression inheritance.

• In LEAP, scenarios are defined as self-consistent narratives describing the potential evolution of a future energy system based on specific socioeconomic settings and policy conditions. They allow users to perform 'what if' analyses to evaluate energy requirements, environmental impacts, and social costs and benefits by testing variables such as the introduction of renewable energy technologies, more efficient appliances, different electric generation capacity expansion plans, or the discovery of indigenous oil and gas reserves.
• All scenarios in LEAP utilize a shared set of Current Accounts data, which can consist of a single base year or multiple historical years. A scenario's timeframe extends from the First Scenario Year to the End Year; if only one base year is provided in the Current Accounts, the First Scenario Year is the year immediately following that base year.
• LEAP scenarios incorporate factors that change over time, including policy interventions and socioeconomic assumptions, the latter of which are termed 'sensitivities'. To ensure accurate cost-benefit analysis, users should only compare scenarios that share the same socioeconomic assumptions. To simplify data management, LEAP uses a hierarchical organization and 'expression inheritance,' meaning data only needs to be entered in a scenario if it differs from its parent scenario.

APA

Stockholm Environment Institute (n.d.). Scenarios. https://cdn.leap.sei.org/Help24/Concepts/Scenarios.htm

Chicago

Stockholm Environment Institute. Scenarios. n.d. https://cdn.leap.sei.org/Help24/Concepts/Scenarios.htm.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Stockholm Environment Institute |title=Scenarios |url=https://cdn.leap.sei.org/Help24/Concepts/Scenarios.htm |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{stockholmenvironmentinstitutendscenarios, author = {{Stockholm Environment Institute}}, title = {{Scenarios}}, institution = {Stockholm Environment Institute}, url = {https://cdn.leap.sei.org/Help24/Concepts/Scenarios.htm}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }