PhD Project: Navigating the energy transition is a unique governance challenge involving a plethora of different actors on different scales. Subnational actors in particular are increasingly seen as playing an important role in facilitating sustainable energy transitions. This calls for a shared understanding of decarbonization strategies to ensure local, regional, and national efforts are aligned and mutually reinforcing.

This thesis is to support this multi-scale governance by developing and implementing multi-scale energy modelling approaches and exploring scenario pathways spanning local to national scale. Scenario pathways are a well-established way to shape thinking about the future energy system and to inform energy planning and policy-making. The work complements other local and national models by providing pathways consistent across scales and, thus, the means to help shape coordination and common thinking on decarbonization strategies across scales. As an example, the work considers the UK heat sector.