MESSAGEix-Materials (model.material)

Description

This module adds material stock and flow accounting in MESSAGEix-GLOBIOM. The implementation models currently four key energy- & emission-intensive industries explicitly:

  • Iron & Steel

  • Aluminum

  • Cement

  • Chemicals

The original generalized industry representation in MESSAGEix-GLOBIOM is re-purposed to represent “other industries” that are not modelled with the explicit material module, but still require a representation in the energy system. The methodology and model structure of MESSAGEix-Materials is described in Ünlü et al. (2024) [120].

Data preparation

The model build uses a set of data preparation scripts to prepare and read the data into the model. Each industry sector has a dedicated data preparation script that generates representative MESSAGEix parameter data. The basis of the parameter data is read from a set of input files, which are described in Input data for MESSAGEix-Materials.

Usage

Use the CLI command mix-data material-ix to invoke the commands defined in material.cli.

$ mix-models material-ix --help
Usage: mix-models material-ix [OPTIONS] {LED|SSP1|SSP2|SSP3|SSP4|SSP5} COMMAND
                              [ARGS]...

  MESSAGEix-Materials variant.

Options:
  --help  Show this message and exit.

Commands:
  build   Build a scenario.
  report  Run materials specific reporting, then legacy reporting.
  solve   Solve a scenario.

Use mix-models materials-ix {SSP} build to add the material implementation on top of existing standard global (R12) scenarios, also giving the base scenario and indicating the relevant data location, e.g.:

mix-models \
    --url="ixmp://ixmp_dev/MESSAGEix-GLOBIOM 1.1-R12/baseline_DEFAULT#21" \
    material-ix SSP2 build --tag test --nodes R12

The output scenario name will be baseline_DEFAULT_test. An additional tag --tag can be used to add an additional suffix to the new scenario name. The mode option --mode has two different inputs ‘by_url’ (by default) or ‘by_copy’. The first one uses the provided --url to add the materials implementation on top of the scenario from the url. This is the default option. The latter is used to create a 2 degree mitigation scenario with materials by copying carbon prices to the scenario that is specified by --scenario_name:

mix-models --url="ixmp://ixmp_dev/MESSAGEix-Materials/scenario_name" material-ix \
 build --tag test --mode by_copy

This command line only builds the scenario but does not solve it. To solve the scenario, use mix-models materials-ix solve, giving the scenario name, e.g.:

mix-models --url="ixmp://ixmp_dev/MESSAGEix-Materials/scenario_name" material-ix \
 SSP2 solve --add_calibration False --add_macro False

Note

To include endogenous modelling of material stocks from power sector message_ix version needs to be:

The solve command has the --add_calibration option to add MACRO calibration to a baseline scenario with a valid calibration file specified with --macro-file. The --add_macro option determines whether the scenario should be solved with MESSAGE or MESSAGE-MACRO. MESSAGEix-Materials provides one calibration file that is only compatible with scenarios with first model year 2025 and the common model structure of a MESSAGEix-GLOBIOM scenario. To first calibrate the scenario and then solve that scenario with MACRO both options should be set to :any`True`.

It is also possible to shift the first model year and solve a clone with shifted years with --shift_model_year. If --shift_model_year is set together with the macro options the model year will be shifted before the MACRO calibration.

All three options are False by default.

Reporting

The reporting generates specific variables related to materials, mainly Production and Final Energy. The resulting reporting file is generated under message_ix_models/data/material/reporting_output with the name “New_Reporting_MESSAGEix-Materials_scenario_name.xlsx”. More detailed variables related to the whole energy system and emissions are not included in this reporting.

Reporting is executed by the following command:

mix-models --url="ixmp://ixmp_dev/MESSAGEix-Materials/scenario_name" \
    --local-data "./data" material-ix SSP2 report

To remove any existing timeseries in the scenario the following command can be used:

mix-models --url="ixmp://ixmp_dev/MESSAGEix-Materials/scenario_name" material-ix \
    SSP2 report --remove_ts True

Code reference

message_ix_models.model.material

Release notes

This is the list of changes to MESSAGEix-Materials between each release.

Note

See also PR #130/the archived branch materials-migrate for a distinct version of material. That earlier PR was superseded by PR #188, but contains the 1.0.0 version of MESSAGEix-Materials, which was used for the first submission of [120]. The model structure is almost identical to the default model that was added by PR #188. Compared to PR #188 this version differs particularly in the following areas:

  • Older base year calibration of “other industries” using outdated IEA EWEB data.

  • Material demands computed in R through rpy2, instead of Python implementation.

  • Less accurate regional allocation/aggregation of base year demands for cement and steel.

  • No use of tools.costs.