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Introduction and contents

The RE4AFAGRI platform is a multi-model framework to analyse deficits, requirements, and optimal solutions for integrated land-water-agriculture-energy-development nexus interlinkages in developing countries.

A more comprehensive background on the design and principles behind the RE4AFAGRI platform is found in Falchetta, G., Adeleke, A., Awais, M., Byers, E., Copinschi, P., Duby, S., ... & Hafner, M. (2022). A renewable energy-centred research agenda for planning and financing Nexus development objectives in rural sub-Saharan Africa. Energy Strategy Reviews, 43, 100922. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esr.2022.100922

The platform combines and soft-links four standalone peer-reviewed modelling tools:

• WaterCROP: WaterCROP is an evapotranspiration model to estimate the crop water demand by source (rainfall plus irrigation) as a function of the soil moisture available in the soil and the potential for irrigation expansion (by source, surface water or groundwater bodies) based on current yield gap. https://doi.org/10.1002/2015WR017148

• M-LED: M-LED is a Multi-sectoral Latent Electricity Demand geospatial data processing platform to estimate electricity demand in communities that live in energy poverty. The platform leverages big data and bottom-up energy modelling to represent the potential electricity demand with high spatio-temporal and sectoral granularity, with specific attention to the implications for water-energy-agriculture-development interlinkages. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac0cab

• OnSSET: OnSSET (the Open Source Spatial Electrification Tool) is a GIS based optimization tool that has been developed to support electrification planning and decision making for the achievement of energy access goals in currently unserved locations. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa7b29

• NEST: NEST (The NExus Solutions Tool) is a modeling platform that integrates multi-scale energy–water–land resource optimization with distributed hydrological modeling, providing insights into the vulnerability of water, energy and land resources to future socioeconomic and climatic change and how multi-sectoral policies, technological solutions and investments can improve the resilience and sustainability of transformation pathways while avoiding counterproductive interactions among sectors. https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-1095-2020

Platform user guide, contents

This page and the relative sub-pages are the official user guide to the code and data RE4AFAGRI platform repositories. It is structured into eight pages, each containing sub-section detailing the preparation, utilisation, and customisation of the four RE4AFAGRI model and of the platform as a whole, including the interactive visualisation dashboard.

• Data download
• Scenarios and their customisation
• WaterCROP
• M-LED
• OnSSET
• NEST
• Models-linking
• Interactive-dashboards
• Examples-and-exercises
• Capacity-building-events

Support

General queries: open an issue on this repository.

• For WaterCROP: contact [email protected]
• For M-LED: contact [email protected]
• For OnSSET: contact [email protected]
• For NEST: contact [email protected]