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openENTRANCE / openentrance

Definitions of common terms (variables, regions, etc.) for the openENTRANCE project
http://openentrance.eu
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Confusing variable names #34

Open erikfilias opened 4 years ago

erikfilias commented 4 years ago

There are similar variable names that can be misunderstood. So, I think that we can make a brief discussion on this issue about what variables have similar names to clarify its purpose and propose new names if possible.

For example:

Final Energy|Transportation|Electricity:

  | description: Final energy consumption by the transportation sector of electricity (including on-site solar pv), excluding transmission/distribution losses   | energy source: electricity   | sector: all   | energy use: transportation   | unit: EJ/yr

Final Energy|Electricity|Transportation:

  | description: Final electricity consumption for electric-transport(including e-cars, e-trucks),   | energy source: electricity   | sector: all   | energy use: transportation   | unit: GWh/yr

Comment:

The first one defines the consumption of energy (fossil fuels, RES, etc.) by the transportation sector of the power industry to produce electricity, I think. And, the second one defines the electricity consumption for transportation.

Don't hesitate to include more comments if you find a couple of similar variables.

sandrinecharousset commented 4 years ago

From my point of view both variables are exactly the same thing : represents the electricity used for transport by all different sectors "the electricity consumption for transportation". We can see that from the lines under the variable: energy source: electricity => means we are talking only of electricity as the energy used for transport (no liquid fuels....) sector: all => means the users of this energy are everyone (all different segments of consumers): residential, commercial, industry, transport companies (like railway, companies whose business model is transport by trucks - etrucks here) energy use: transportation => means this energy is used for transport (individuals using their e-cars to go to work, commercials using e-vehicles for their deliveries, .....)

Here we do not look at 'how the electricity used was produced'; in both cases it may have been produced using all kinds of fuels, but as here we define a 'final energy', we do not care.

"The first one defines the consumption of energy (fossil fuels, RES, etc.) by the transportation sector of the power industry to produce electricity, I think.", would have in the definition "sector: transportation" ; What do you mean by "the transportation sector of the power industry"?

erikfilias commented 4 years ago

As these variables are written now, I think the second one is defined correctly. I have tried to interpret the description of the first but excuse me if I have not given the whole possible new description. I aforementioned the transportation sector of the power industry because I tried to see this variable as the use of every kind of energy by the transportation sector associated with other sectors (power industry, food industry, etc) from a macro view. This can be seen as a division of transport consumption by each sector.

Then, the new definition could be:

Final Energy|Transportation|Electricity:

  | description: the consumption of energy (fossil fuels, RES, etc.) by the transportation sector associated with the power industry   | energy source: All   | sector: all   | energy use: transportation   | unit: EJ/yr

I think that maybe it was not the original purpose for this variable or maybe I'm wrong, but the purpose of this issue is to get an agreement for this kind of variable that creates confusion and gets the attention of modelers who could use it. We can get a new interpretation or remove it.

sandrinecharousset commented 4 years ago

@erikfilias Unless anyone claims he needs the second variable, I would remove it. I still cannot understand what is "the transportation sector associated with the power industry" (sorry....). I completely agree that we should pay attention to avoiding confusion (if you look at the very first pull request, you may see that we already have lots of discussions around those variables with some interpretations being different for modellers from the IAM side or modellers from the electricity side . this led to adding the dedicated lines "sector" and "use" because there were many ambiguities between who consumes and for which uses is it consumed Seems there are still remaining ambiguities. I believe one of the main advantage of our approacj for building that nomenclature is that cross-checking between modellers from different perspectives. At the end we should obtain a very good result!

here I would think the original purpose was the same for both variables and they were duplicated by mistake, but maybe I am wrong. @danielhuppmann what do you think?)

danielhuppmann commented 4 years ago

Thanks @erikfilias and @sandrinecharousset - indeed the variable Final Energy|Transportation|Electricity was most likely added by mistake and should be removed - it even says so in the readme...