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Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM)

PNNL and the University of Maryland's Joint Global Change Research Institute is the home and primary development institution for the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM - formerly MiniCAM), an integrated assessment tool for exploring consequences and responses to global change. GCAM is a dynamic-recursive model with technology-rich representations of the economy, energy sector, land use and water linked to a climate model that can be used to explore climate change mitigation policies including carbon taxes, carbon trading, regulations and accelerated deployment of energy technology. Using a run period extending from 1990 – 2100 at 5 year intervals, GCAM has been used to explore the potential role of emerging energy supply technologies and the greenhouse gas consequences of specific policy measures or energy technology adoption including; CO2 capture and storage, bioenergy, hydrogen systems, nuclear energy, renewable energy technology, and energy use technology in buildings, industry and the transportation sectors.