The Copernicus Climate Change Service ‘European Climatic Energy Mixes’

The energy sector is undergoing a major transformation. This transformation in the energy sector is taking place against a variable and changing climate. Given the weather-and climate-dependency of both renewable energy and demand (even in the case of large storage uptake), it is important to develop robust climate-based tools to advise energy planners and policy makers. The EU Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) European Climatic Energy Mixes (ECEM) is producing, in close collaboration with prospective users, a proof-of-concept climate service, or demonstrator, whose purpose is to enable the energy industry and policy makers to assess how well different energy supply mixes in Europe will meet demand, over different time horizons (from seasonal to long-term decadal planning), focusing on the role climate has on the mixes. This presentation will provide details about the calibration of climate variables over the historic period (last ca. 40 years) derived from reanalyses that was necessary in order to reduce the bias in variables relevant to the energy sector, such as wind speed and solar radiation. The conversion of climate variables into energy variables for wind power, solar power and hydropower, by means of both statistical methods and physical methods where possible, and for various European countries is also presented. An assessment of seasonal climate forecasts for use by the energy sector over the European domain will also be discussed.