Week 10 Reading
Exploratory Modeling & Scenario Discovery
Overview
Read Lamontagne et al. (2019). Focus on the main text and figures (skip the Methods section and Supplementary Material unless you’re curious).
Wednesday Discussion: Figure Jigsaw
On Wednesday, each person will lead a 3-minute explanation of one figure or figure group from the paper. Sign up for your slot on Monday in class.
| Slot | Figure(s) | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Fig 1a | How did they sample the policy space? Why exponential growth in abatement? |
| 2 | Fig 1b–d | What do the tradeoff clouds show? How is “tolerable” defined? |
| 3 | Fig 2a | Which factors dominate each metric? What’s surprising? |
| 4 | Fig 2b–d | How do factor sensitivities shift over time? What’s the policy implication? |
| 5 | Fig 3a–b | How do robust abatement pathways narrow as climate sensitivity rises? |
| 6 | Fig 3c + conclusion | What happens at median climate sensitivity? What’s the headline message? |
For your presentation, address:
- What the figure shows (axes, colors, key features)
- So what — the main takeaway
- What assumption or choice would change the result
Prep Question
Each person should also prepare one discussion question about the paper (not necessarily about your figure). Good questions connect the paper’s methods or findings to concepts from earlier in the course or to your final project context.
References
Lamontagne, J. R., Reed, P. M., Marangoni, G., Keller, K., & Garner, G. G. (2019). Robust abatement pathways to tolerable climate futures require immediate global action. Nature Climate Change, 9(4), 290–294. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0426-8