Future waste treatment and energy systems – examples of joint scenarios

Development and use of scenarios for large interdisciplinary projects is a complicated task. This article provides practical examples of how it has been carried out in two projects addressing waste management and energy issues respectively. Based on experiences from the two projects, recommendations are made for an approach concerning development of scenarios in projects dealing with both waste management and energy issues.

Recommendations are given to develop and use overall scenarios for the project and leave room for sub-scenarios in parts of the project. Combining different types of scenarios is recommended, too, in order to adapt to the methods and tools of different disciplines, such as developing predictive scenarios with general equilibrium tools and analysing explorative scenarios with energy system analysis tools.

Furthermore, as marginals identified in differing future background systems determine the outcomes of consequential life cycle assessments (LCAs), it is considered advisable to develop and use explorative external scenarios based on possible marginals as a framework for consequential LCAs. This approach is illustrated using an on-going Danish research project.