LIMA
The Interdisciplinary Laboratory of the Environment (LIMA), connected to the Energy Planning Program (PPE), is part of the Technology Center of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), whose objective is to strengthen the action of professors and students at the Alberto Luiz Coimbra Institute for Graduate Studies and Research in Engineering (COPPE) in the area of Environmental Engineering, enabling the carrying out of joint studies and projects and the consolidation of interdisciplinary lines of research in this area.
LIMA was created in December 1997 with the support of the area of Environmental Sciences of the Scientific and Technological Support Program (PADCT/CIAMB) and resources of the World Bank and the Ministry of Science and Technology. It is one of the results of the integrated research program conducted between 1995 and 1997 that involved the development of Environmental Auditing methodologies and the consolidation of the Master’s and Doctorate courses in the Interdisciplinary Area of Environmental Engineering, with an emphasis on the subareas of Environmental Planning, Environmental Geotechnics, Environmental Management of Production, Environmental Technology, Environmental Modelling, Coastal and River Basin Management, Environmental Acoustics, and Transportation and the Environment.
CENERGIA
The Center for Energy and Environmental Economy (CENERGIA), created in 2002, is an integrated research laboratory of the Energy Planning Program (PPE) at COPPE/UFRJ.
The mission of CENERGIA is to develop applied research and disseminate innovative knowledge about complex interactions between the energy sector and socioeconomic development and the global and local environmental dimensions. Through the application of pioneering energy planning modeling tools, the work of CENERGIA supports energy and climate policy makers in the understanding of the synergies and conflicts associated with technological innovation for a transition to an economy of low carbon emission in Brazil, the Latin America and the world.
CENERGIA has worked intensely with integrated energy and environmental optimization models, especially with the model MESSAGE-Brazil since 2003, and more recently, with the national models TIMES-Brazil and REMIX-CEM-B, and the global models COFFEE (Computable Integrated Framework for Energy and the Environment) and TEA (Total-Economy integrated Assessment Model, a computable general equilibrium model).
With time, these integrated assessment models (IAMs) have been improved and adapted to better represent the energy and land use sectors in Brazil, Latin America and the world, incorporating more than 8,000 technological options of energy supply and demand and their interactions with economic development, climate change, air pollution, water consumption and changes in land use.
Moreover, the IAMs developed at CENERGIA are integrated with specific models adapted and/or created at the laboratory, such as the refining model CAESAR or even other tools prepared for life cycle assessment, process analysis, assessment of carbon capture facilities, concentrated solar power, PV, etc.
Climate Center
Created in 2000 through a partnership established between the Secretariat for Environmental Quality at Human Settlements (SQA) of the Ministry of the Environment (MMA) and COPPE/UFRJ, Climate Center has actively participated in the development of public policies and the strengthening of training for different national and international social agents regarding actions to mitigate and adapt to climate change, focusing on the development of municipal and state greenhouse gas inventories, the construction and analysis of mitigation scenarios, the development of innovative projects of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and the adaptation of small rural producers to the increased droughts caused by climate change.