Thursday, February 12, 2026 | 5:00 - 6:00 PM
Politecnico di Milano - Bovisa Campus
Sala Vento (Building 31)
Speakers: Alice di Bella, Leonardo Chiani
Contacts: phd-step@polimi.it
Sommario
Join us for the sixth seminar in our Meet the STEP-CHANGErs series, a platform showcasing the innovative research of PhD students in the Science, Technology, and Policy for Sustainable Change program. Each session explores cutting-edge sustainability challenges and solutions, offering insights into how emerging research shapes real-world systemic change. The seminars also provide a valuable networking opportunity, with an aperitif following each session.
This session features two exciting talks:
Alice di Bella - Modelling future scenarios for a clean and resilient European energy system
This research examines how economic and geopolitical risks shape the feasibility and robustness of Europe’s industrial decarbonisation pathways. Focusing on energy-intensive industries and international trade, it combines high-resolution energy system modelling with macroeconomic analysis to assess competitiveness under climate policy constraints.
The first paper investigates the decarbonisation of European industry by embedding plant-level industrial production within a continent-wide energy system model and allowing different production volumes. It evaluates alternative strategies for pushing competitiveness, including intra-European relocation, imports of low-carbon intermediates, and government subsidies, under consistent climate targets. The results show that while deep industrial decarbonisation is technically feasible, maintaining competitiveness requires carefully targeted policies and avoidance of aggressive reindustrialisation strategies.
The third paper extends the analysis to the international context by coupling a European energy system model with a computable general equilibrium model to assess interactions between climate policy and trade disruptions. Using recent trade tensions in energy-intensive sectors as a case study, it demonstrates that trade policies can significantly alter decarbonisation pathways, system costs, and competitiveness outcomes. Together, these papers highlight the need for risk-aware climate strategies that integrate energy, industrial, and trade policy considerations.
Leonardo Chiani - Untangling uncertainties in coupled climate-economy models
This doctoral research focuses on advancing uncertainty quantification in coupled climate-economy models through the development and application of novel Global Sensitivity Analysis (GSA) methods based on Optimal Transport theory. The study pursues two main streams: first, theoretical and computational advancements in GSA, including the creation of an R package (gsaot) for estimating multivariate sensitivity indices and the exploration of neural solvers for scalable Optimal Transport problems; second, the application of these tools to assess parameter uncertainty in leading Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) such as RICE50+ and WITCH.
The research provides the first comprehensive uncertainty and sensitivity analysis of regionalized climate-economy models with multivariate outputs, identifying key drivers like carbon intensity and climate response parameters. It also incorporates emerging technologies like Direct Air Capture into uncertainty frameworks, evaluating their potential role in climate mitigation. By bridging advanced statistical methodology with policy-oriented modelling, this work enhances the interpretability and reliability of IAM projections, offering actionable insights for climate policy design and decision-making under deep uncertainty.