International Context

The concept of Carbon Calculator 2050 was developed by the UK Government in 2009, when the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC for its acronym in English) was commissioned to develop a goal of reducing emissions of greenhouse gases to the country. The goal, a reduction of 80% from the 1990 base year 2050 was the first legally binding global.

Since there was much uncertainty about which technologies would be available in the future for how to achieve the set goal, the team of DECC decided to create a new tool to explore all available options, instead of using existing models to directly define an optimal path for reducing emissions without allowing an exploration of different technologies from the perspective of reduction potential. This tool was the Carbon Calculator 2050 (in English: 2050 Pathways Calculator). A number of key messages were developed based on the possible paths that would achieve the goal of reducing the country, and these messages were used for the development of the national UK strategy for reducing emissions of greenhouse gases in 2011 ( Carbon Plan).

The UK also developed a simplified version of the Carbon Calculator My2050 call, which led the calculator to the general public. More than 17,000 people in the UK have created their low emissions scenarios using the My2050 tool, which gives a broad perspective on the opinion of the population.

Since then, about 20 countries, regions and territories have adapted a similar approach and are developing or have developed their own calculators to feed policy development and to increase awareness of the population on issues of mitigating climate change and energy. To date China, the region of Wallonia in Belgium, India, South Africa, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea have carbon calculators.