Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    While some studies have emphasized the difficulties involved in decarbonizing transport, there is robust evidence that battery electric vehicles (BEVs) will form the backbone of future low-carbon road transport. Accordingly, BEVs prevail in the future portfolios of car manufacturers and several European countries will enforce 100% zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) sales for cars by at least 2035, banning large-scale sales of conventional vehicles as sufficient quantities of sustainable fuels are unlikely. ...

    Options:
    A. Other key markets, such as the United States and China, have also set ambitious ZEV targets from the 2030s.
B. Regarding battery demand, electrified transport is widely recognized as the key driver and catalyst for battery advances.
C. However, any projection of battery demand is highly uncertain and scenario-dependent, generally based on concealed models and subject to unclear assumptions.
D. Hence, global demand projections for 2030 cover a wide spectrum, typically 3-6 TWh yr-1 and up to almost 9 TWh yr-1, with European projections at around 0.7-1.4 TWh yr-1.
E. Batteries are of critical importance for the rapid reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to mitigate global warming and meet the 1.5 °C target of the Paris Agreement by enabling the widespread use of renewable electricity.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Regarding battery production, electrification requires industrial transformation and the establishment of new battery ecosystems alongside the entire value chain from raw material extraction to end-of-life, and including concepts of circularity, such as second use or recycling. In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic and other geopolitical tensions have created awareness of vulnerable economic dependencies and spurred the development of modern concepts such as technological sovereignty and resilience. ...

    Options:
    A. In response, the European Union (EU) recently finalized the Net-Zero Industry Act, intending to ensure ample capacity for strategic net-zero technologies by 2030.
B. Probabilistic modelling is developing as an accurate and flexible tool to assess the feasibility of future climate change mitigation pathways and modelling technology diffusion.
C. However, any projection of battery demand is highly uncertain and scenario-dependent, generally based on concealed models and subject to unclear assumptions.
D. We adopted this approach to independently project future battery demand and domestic production in Europe and to evaluate Europe's pathway towards battery self-sufficiency via feasibility spaces and probabilistic statements.
E. Batteries are of critical importance for the rapid reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to mitigate global warming and meet the 1.5 °C target of the Paris Agreement by enabling the widespread use of renewable electricity.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    First, we estimated domestic production using existing and announced cell production facilities and their stated capacities. There are different motivations for publicly announced production facilities and taking them at face value can easily lead to the overestimation of actual capacity and high ad hoc availability. ...

    Options:
    A. However, uncertainties in multiyear projects are inevitable as they invariably involve delays related to construction, permits or equipment readiness, cancellations or postponements, step-by-step expansion plans, evolutionary advances in production technologies or quality issues.
B. Probabilistic modelling is developing as an accurate and flexible tool to assess the feasibility of future climate change mitigation pathways and modelling technology diffusion.
C. Accordingly, we extended the recent advances by Odenweller et al., which were based on Roger's concept of technology adoption and typical S-shaped diffusion curves.
D. We adopted this approach to independently project future battery demand and domestic production in Europe and to evaluate Europe's pathway towards battery self-sufficiency via feasibility spaces and probabilistic statements.
E. These characteristics result from two typical ramp-up phases following an earlier planning period: time-to-market and time-to-volume.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Over the last decade, central banks have taken on a role in examining and managing transition risks as well as physical climate risks. These risks are not only firm-level risks but can amount to systemic risks. ...

    Options:
    A. After the financial crisis of 2008-2009, central banks have grown more occupied with financial and macroeconomic stability, and finance is the transmission belt of transition risks.
B. Energy transition and climate change both entail risks for the global economy.
C. As the global economy decarbonizes, fossil fuel investments face stranded asset risks, that is, lost profits owing to early retirement.
D. Stranded asset risks threaten financial stability.
E. Similarly, exposure to climate hazards contributes to financial stability risk.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    First, we hypothesize that a central bank is more likely to re-risk, the greater the stranded assets risks are in the economy and financial system it oversees. This follows from central banks' mandate to ensure financial stability. ...

    Options:
    A. How to best measure stranded asset risks is an ongoing debate, and a key part of central bank engagement with transition risks is to better understand the type and magnitude of these risks.
B. Similarly, a large financial sector increases the direct exposure of an economy to stranded asset risks, which could threaten financial stability.
C. We measure the size of the oil and gas sector by calculating the oil and gas sector share of a country's gross domestic product (GDP) and the size of the financial sector as domestic credit provided by the financial sector as a share of GDP.
D. This includes specifically protecting financial stability, which decarbonization and climate change can disrupt.
E. Here, we test economic explanations for both re-risking and de-risking and turn towards the political explanation in the next section.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We do not find an association between exposure to climate hazards and re-risking. Instead, we find that de-risking is positively and significantly correlated with higher exposure to physical climate risks. ...

    Options:
    A. This is puzzling and requires further analysis.
B. Similarly, a large financial sector increases the direct exposure of an economy to stranded asset risks, which could threaten financial stability.
C. It follows that if a country is highly exposed to physical climate risks, it would adopt these practices.
D. In fact, prior research has demonstrated a correlation between physical risks and central bank management of climate risks.
E. We measure climate hazard exposure by using the exposure component of the Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative (ND-Gain) country index.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Second, the large scale of the planned changes in the total capacity and the composition of the grids of European countries by 2030 and, in particular, the very large increase of renewable capacity could result in very different pricing dynamics from past experience. Whereas studies based on the history of prices in Europe provide important insights, extrapolation to future price behaviour from them is thus potentially problematic. ...

    Options:
    A. Our design allows simulation of the prices resulting from future capacity, with consistent projections for future electricity demand (which include the effects of electric vehicle and heat pump penetration) and adjusting for changing climate.
B. The European Energy and Climate Plans foresee substantial reductions in coal and nuclear capacity across Europe, whereas the increasing strin- gency of the European Trading System for CO2 could further increase the marginal cost of coal generation, all of which would push for a potentially larger role of natural gas technologies.
C. In view of this, we develop a measure specifically aimed at capturing the sensitivity of annual prices to variations in the price of natural gas.
D. In view of the shift described in the previous paragraph, our goal is to understand how renewables would affect the properties of power prices that are more relevant for macroeconomic stability.
E. At the same time, while renewables have long been known to be critical to the achievement of climate goals and a key topic in regulation.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Going beyond the standard deviation as a metric to capture stability is important because renewables can soften the incidence of extreme prices. We present the 85th percentile (p85) as a reference for high but reasonably frequent prices and the 95th percentile (p95) as the reference for extremely high but very infrequent prices. ...

    Options:
    A. These two metrics are better suited to capture the needs of policymakers and the interests of consumers.
B. The volatility of annual prices would also be lower, but the size of this change is less relevant: one standard deviation in electricity prices would be equivalent to 25 euros in 2030, very similar to the 26.5 euros expected in 2024.
C. Importantly, the reduction in electricity prices would not be homogeneous across the hours of the day, particularly in countries adding solar PV capacity.
D. In view of the shift described in the previous paragraph, our goal is to understand how renewables would affect the properties of power prices that are more relevant for macroeconomic stability.
E. As an example, in Germany, prices would be 64% lower in 2030 than in 2024 at 12 in the morning, whereas the reduction at 7 p.m. would be only 16%.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    A different measure is required to capture the relationship between electricity prices and the price of fossil fuels and, particularly, natural gas. Studies on the influence of the price of natural gas on electricity prices have mostly considered the number of hours in a year where plants burning natural gas are the marginal price setter. ...

    Options:
    A. This is a partial approach that can lead to biased policy conclusions regarding the influence of natural gas, especially in systems with higher levels of storage capacity (in hydro reservoirs or batteries) or in systems with high interconnections.
B. A different measure is required to capture the relationship between electricity prices and the price of fossil fuels and, particularly, natural gas.
C. Studies on the influence of the price of natural gas on electricity prices have mostly considered the number of hours in a year where plants burning natural gas are the marginal price setter.
D. This is a partial approach that can lead to biased policy conclusions regarding the influence of natural gas, especially in systems with higher levels of storage capacity (in hydro reservoirs or batteries) or in systems with high interconnections.
E. As an example, in Germany, prices would be 64% lower in 2030 than in 2024 at 12 in the morning, whereas the reduction at 7 p.m. would be only 16%.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Historically, global IAMs have predominantly emphasized supplyside measures in global mitigation scenarios, which has limited their capacity to address demand-side pathways effectively. This has been complicated by the complexity of consumer groups and behaviour, diverse sectors, services and technologies that depend on local circumstances, climate and socio-economic conditions, infrastructures and technological development. ...

    Options:
    A. However, in recent years, IAMs have improved their representation of energy-demand sectors, particularly in the buildings and transport sectors.
B. Integrated assessment models (IAMs) are specifically designed to capture interactions among the energy system, economy and environment, making them valuable tools for assessing the potential of demand-side intervention strategies in the buildings and transport sectors.
C. These models not only facilitate the systematic assessment of the impacts of such strategies through scenario analysis but also incorporate the system-wide impacts that arise from their implementation.
D. Integrated modelling frameworks allow to build consolidated trajectories whereas ensuring consistency not only between sectors and intervention strategies but also over time.
E. Although a complete disentangling of the contributions of these interactions within each model is beyond the scope of this study, our work aims to provide a robust assessment of demand-side measures potentials and interactions across the structural uncertainty of the models included.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    In current climate policy scenarios (NPi), emissions reductions in the ELE and ALL scenarios by 2050 are less pronounced when accounting for indirect emissions based on average emissions intensities. Particularly for buildings, indirect emissions remain high in the near term due to limited supply-side decarbonization and the sector's heavy reliance on electricity. ...

    Options:
    A. In contrast, the transport sector has a considerably larger share of fossil fuel use, which offers greater potential for emissions reductions through electrification, as there is more opportunity to replace fossil fuels with cleaner alternatives.
B. In light of increasing electricity demand, it is critical to expand the capacity of the energy supply sector while simultaneously decarbonizing it, as previous research has already suggested.
C. Our scenarios show that integrating electrification with other demand-side strategies (ALL) can facilitate necessary transitions, potentially decreasing global electricity demand by 10 to 39 EJ per year, even under a 1.5 °C climate target.
D. Depending on the model and climate policy, this reduction represents 8 to 33% of the electricity demand for transport and buildings.
E. This demonstrates that a comprehensive strategy combining electrification with energy efficiency and activity-focused measures substantially reduces the need for supply-side investments in low-carbon generation technologies, large-scale electricity storage and electricity infrastructure and grids.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Regional disparities are driven by opposing dynamics in service demand and energy efficiency. As lower- and middle-income countries get wealthier, they increasingly demand more energy services for appliances, heating and cooling to support their improved living standards. ...

    Options:
    A. At the same time, the use of traditional fuels, which are still commonly used for cooking in certain areas (predominantly in Africa), decreases substantially until 2050.
B. In transport, per capita energy demand reduces in some regions, despite rising demand for mobility, due to increased use of electric vehicles with much higher efficiency than internal combustion engine vehicles.
C. In contrast to the global results, some models signal that emissions from buildings could be higher in ACT and TEC, probably due to rebound effects. This is particularly noticeable in India, other Asian and Africa and Middle East.
D. The strongest disparities of demand-side strategies for developing countries compared to more advanced economies reflect the strong correlation between energy demand and economic development, which is likely to be a challenge for an early adoption of demand-side policies in the upcoming years.
E. On the other hand, some interventions, such as reducing the floor space per capita, increasing the energy efficiency in buildings and using low-carbon transport modes, strongly depend on the way emerging cities will be shaped.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Energy system models (ESMs) on the other hand commonly represent VRE explicitly, with a high spatial and temporal resolution, and some ESMs have recently been enhanced to encompass all energy sectors simultaneously. This enables a sector-coupled analysis of biomass usage for energy across all sectors and of interactions with competing fuel options that can be produced from VRE sources, such as hydrogen and electrofuels. ...

    Options:
    A. However these models usually include a restricted selection of biomass applications and, in contrast to IAMs, only a few studies based on sector-coupled ESMs have focused explicitly on biomass, bioenergy and/or BECC, and a thorough assessment of biomass usage including BECCUS across usage options is still lacking.
B. IAM and ESM studies commonly focus on the single cost-optimal solution, complemented with some sensitivity analyses.
C. However, social planning projects are subject to a plurality of economic and socio-political objectives63,64, and uncertainties and objectively irreconcilable trade-offs at different levels regarding future energy systems and biomass use are so-called wicked facets of their planning.
D. The sector-coupled energy system involves diverse stakeholders with conflicting non-economic objectives and risk perceptions, and past energy transitions have been found not to follow cost-optimal paths in hindsight.
E. There is therefore a value in exploring the diversity of near-optimal solutions for the energy system in general and for biomass usage in particular, to provide insights for policy about the flexibility of solutions.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    In the cost-optimal solution for the net-negative scenario, wind (54%), solar photovoltaics (PV) (40%) and hydropower (5%) supply 99% of the whole electricity demand at 9,250 TWh, which is almost three times the electricity demand in 2021. Biomass is mainly used to complement the supply of fuels and chemicals for industry, aviation and shipping, but a small share is also used to supply dispatchable electricity. ...

    Options:
    A. Some 637 TWh biogas and 2,896 TWh solid biomass (2,172 TWh imported) are used, corresponding to 29% of the annual primary energy consumption at 13 PWh.
B. If overall biomass usage is restricted to current usage levels, the system cost ends up ~5% higher than without restrictions.
C. If all biomass (except mandatory incineration of municipal solid waste) is excluded, it leads to a 20% higher system cost, or an additional cost of €169 billion annually, roughly corresponding to European defence expenses.
D. This is twice as much as the cost of excluding solar power and similar to the cost of excluding wind power, despite both of them cost optimally providing more primary energy.
E. Excluding any of these primary energy sources thus leads to much higher costs.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    BECC can be excluded at a 13% system cost increase, with mainly biofuel production decreasing whereas biogas and biomass usage for process heat and flexible bioelectricity remain cost effective also without BECC. If BECC is removed, biomass can be excluded within a 6% cost increase, substantially less than with BECC. ...

    Options:
    A. Capturing biogenic CO2 emissions enhances carbon utilization, enabling scarce renewable carbon to be used multiple times and to provide negative emissions.
B. When a higher carbon sequestration allowance permits a larger amount of fossil fuels to be offset by the sequestration of biogenic CO2, the value of the biogenic carbon is up to two times higher.
C. With varying amounts of biomass in the system, CO2 and solid biomass prices are strongly and similarly affected, whereas the hydrogen price is substantially less affected.
D. For the net-negative scenario, 87% of biomass use is cost optimally combined with carbon capture, providing 0.84 Gt biogenic CO2 annually, corresponding to ~21% of total regional GHG emissions in 2021, at 4 Gt CO2-equivalent.
E. The captured amount falls within projected feasible CCS growth already for 2040, of 1-4.3 Gt per year globally, but would require a ramp-up of BECC from currently near-zero commercial capacity to covering almost all biomass conversion.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Following a surge of enthusiasm, the green hydrogen market and associated expectations have recently entered a phase of consolidation as high costs, limited demand and lagging implementation of support policies are hampering deployment. Shortfalls in the announced deployment of electrolysers, the key component for green hydrogen production, are representative of the systemic challenges of scaling up supply, demand and infrastructure at the same time. ...

    Options:
    A. In 2022, instead of the 2.8 GW electrolysis capacity initially announced, eventually only 0.62 GW was realized on time.
B. Similarly, in 2023, of the 7.1 GW initially announced, only an estimated 0.92 GW was realized and operational.
C. In stark contrast to these recent setbacks, announced future growth rates of green hydrogen have increased substantially over the past 3 years, indicating a backlog of projects as well as further increasing ambition.
D. This raises questions such as whether recent failure rates and the looming 'valley of death' can be overcome to meet updated project announcements, whether the expected role of hydrogen in ambitious climate change mitigation scenarios has changed and what plausible implementation pathways exist given currently announced hydrogen support policies.
E. Consequently, policy measures to stimulate the ramp-up of the hydrogen market are gaining momentum as more than 40 governments have already adopted hydrogen strategies.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Green hydrogen project announcements reveal two opposing trends over the past 3 years. First, there has been a notable short-term setback, with capacities diminishing as projects approach their announced launch year. ...

    Options:
    A. This trend of downward-adjusted expectations persists in both 2022 and 2023, indicating a dramatic green hydrogen implementation gap in recent years.
B. Second, however, this trend reverses from 2024 onwards, with project announcements increasing steadily over the past 3 years.
C. This steep mid-term growth of announcements is mostly driven by Europe, which accounts for the largest share of announced capacity by 2030, followed by Australia and Central and South America.
D. These opposing trends raise the question as to whether future promises can overcome past setbacks. We address this question in the next section, following the quantification of the 2022 and 2023 green hydrogen implementation gaps.
E. Consequently, policy measures to stimulate the ramp-up of the hydrogen market are gaining momentum as more than 40 governments have already adopted hydrogen strategies.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Substantial implementation gaps may be common for emerging energy technologies in the early stages of technology diffusion, as large projects almost always exceed their budget and run behind schedule. However, while research has identified similarly high failure rates for complex and customized technologies such as carbon capture and storage, this does not apply to highly modular technologies such as solar photovoltaics (PV) and wind power. ...

    Options:
    A. For green hydrogen, recent evidence suggests that while the mass-producible electrolyser stack is highly modular, other components of the electrolyser system and the overall green hydrogen production plant are more complex and require customization, making them more prone to budget and time overrun.
B. Third, bridging the substantial cost gap and reducing investment risks requires hydrogen-specific support policies and regulation, even in countries with ambitious carbon pricing.
C. However, lagging implementation of support policies1 and regulatory uncertainty regarding green hydrogen production standards in the European Union (EU) and the United States, although crucial to ensure climate benefits, have hampered growth.
D. What implications does the sobering track record of past project announcements have for the future of green hydrogen in ambitious climate change mitigation scenarios?
E. To explore these ramifications, we next focus on the mid-term horizon towards 2030.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Despite the fact that emissions reduction targets and renewable energy production goals are often set at the national or state level, the planning, siting and deployment of large-scale energy infrastructure projects often happens locally, at the county or municipal level. Siting authority varies widely state by state in the USA, but in the vast majority of states, onshore wind and solar siting authority rests either solely at the local level, or authority varies on the basis of project size, where at least some siting happens locally rather than at the state level. ...

    Options:
    A. Thus, local elected officials have a key role to play in the siting of large-scale energy projects, including developing zoning ordinances, voting on project approvals and negotiating community benefits.
B. We find that direct benefits to communities, including the creation of permanent, union-wage jobs and cooperative community ownership, increase support for energy projects.
C. Pennsylvanians prefer solar projects over wind, nuclear and natural gas power plants with carbon capture and storage (CCS).
D. Local elected officials, however, misperceive the preferences of their constituents, underestimating support for renewable energy and the importance of job loss and creation.
E. The public and local elected officials have similar opinions of foreign-owned products, which is associated with the greatest reductions in support.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Beyond support or opposition based on type of technology or energy infrastructure, there are a wide variety of project characteristics that may influence public preferences. In public discourse, large-scale energy projects are routinely framed in ways that emphasize specific risks or benefits to local communities, and support or opposition to projects is often tied to narratives about these risks and benefits. ...

    Options:
    A. At the individual level, narratives help individuals make sense of uncertainty, influence cognition and support or challenge existing power relations and policy outcomes.
B. A rich body of literature examines preferences for siting energy infrastructure, with a focus on renewable energy.
C. Early research focused largely on visual aesthetics and distance from residential areas in response to 'not in my back yard' (NIMBY) concerns from local residents.
D. NIMBY looked to be a promising explanation for the 'social gap' in renewable energy siting decisions—why, when there is consistent broad public support for renewable energy, are specific projects heavily opposed?
E. However, across geographical, cultural and project-specific contexts, there is mixed evidence for the importance of proximity to residential areas as a predictor of opposition to large-scale energy projects.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    While the trends discussed above are supported by various samples and studies, there is also heterogeneity by individual characteristics, including partisanship. While members of both parties in the USA largely support renewable energy, Republican support has dropped in recent years. ...

    Options:
    A. Reasons for renewable support also differ by party: while Republicans express support when they anticipate economic opportunities associated with renewable energy development, Democrats tend to focus on renewables as a climate change solution.
B. In addition to its predilection for local, decentralized decisionmaking, PA is an ideal study site as the state has a rich and diverse energy history.
C. Princeton's Net-Zero America modelling identified PA as a top five state for solar capacity in the decade leading up to 2050, with one model calling for 95 GW of new installed capacity.
D. In addition to being a key state for renewables development in the coming decades, for almost two centuries PA has been central to US energy resources.
E. The state has historically been a site of extractive energy practices, including coal mining and hydraulic fracturing (fracking) of shale gas, which has been linked to adverse public health impacts.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Previous research suggests that alternative solar products can expand access to solar. Specifically, the development of solar leasing models with minimal up-front costs has driven a more equitable expansion of rooftop solar and the recent emergence of solar loans may similarly address up-front cost barriers. ...

    Options:
    A. However, rooftop solar remains largely inaccessible to renters and families living in multifamily housing.
B. The impact of community solar on clean energy access has not been empirically evaluated.
C. In this study, we fill this research gap by analysing the demographic profiles of rooftop and community solar adopters to determine whether existing community solar projects have promoted more equitable adoption.
D. We quantitatively assess household-level demographic data of community solar and rooftop solar adopters, as does other research documenting the demographic profiles of rooftop solar adopters.
E. We explore how the two customer groups vary in terms of median income levels, housing tenure (whether adopters own or rent their homes), housing type (single or multifamily) and race.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    The data firmly support hypotheses 1-3 defined above. Weighting the differences by state sample sizes, the data suggest that community solar adopters are about 6.1 times more likely to live in multifamily buildings than rooftop solar adopters, 4.4 times more likely to rent and earn about 23% less in annual income. ...

    Options:
    A. At the same time, the data suggest that community solar adopters are not demographically representative of the general population.
B. The comparative statistics are mostly statistically insignificant according to the one-sided test that community solar adopters are more likely to identify as people of colour or Hispanic.
C. Across all the states in the sample, rooftop solar adopters are about twice as likely as community solar adopters to identify as Asian/Asian American or Black and about three times as likely to identify as Hispanic.
D. We use a conditional probability model to compare how the different demographic factors explain household adoption decisions (Methods).
E. The models describe the relative power of each demographic factor in predicting whether a household is a community or rooftop solar adopter, conditioned on correlation with the other factors (for example, multifamily building occupants are more likely to rent than single-family occupants).

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We analyse inherent and policy impacts by comparing the demographic profiles of adopters that participated in LMI community solar programmes (programme participants) and those who did not (non-participants). We can only precisely distinguish participants from non-participants in three states: Illinois, New York and Oregon. ...

    Options:
    A. As a robustness check, we obtain similar results based on an analysis of inferred LMI programme participation in three other states.
B. Participants earn significantly less and are more likely to rent and live in multifamily housing than non-participants.
C. Participants are also significantly more likely to identify as people of colour or Hispanic than non-participants.
D. These results imply that community solar policies have effectively expanded access in all four demographic dimensions.
E. The results suggest that various approaches can effectively expand access, as evidenced by the distinct LMI programme structures of the three states in the analysis: Illinois subsidizes LMI customer participation, whereas New York incentivizes LMI customer enrolment at the project level and Oregon administers an LMI carve out.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Understanding the role of different investors and their interactions is essential to effectively incentivize innovation. However, analyses on climate-tech startups tend to focus on public agencies or financially motivated venture capital (VC) in isolation, without considering the combined effects of different investors. ...

    Options:
    A. For example, public funding agencies can de-risk technologies when securing traditional investment is difficult or support technologies relevant for strategic national goals.
B. Climate-impact investors have emerged as a subset of profit-focused investors, with a focus on supporting climate tech while still pursuing financial returns.
C. Corporations, in contrast, are strategic investors that may seek to increase profits but also to achieve goals related to long-term business plans and competitive standing.
D. They can help startups build commercial capacity and credibility, increase innovation output and provide learning benefits, but they can also leave startups at risk for predatory acquisitions that undercut competition and misappropriate intellectual property.
E. The motivations of these different investors collectively determine how investments flow to technology areas and risk levels.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Corporate investors are differentiated from public grants and other private investors in a few key ways. First, they consistently increased in number of investments and amount invested since 2005, even as public grants and other investors saw uneven spates of growth and decline, followed by continuous growth since 2016. ...

    Options:
    A. Second, corporate investment deals peak later in the startup life cycle and skew towards high-value growth equity and late-stage rounds rather than cheaper seed rounds (42.0% of corporate invest- ment deals are for growth equity, compared with 28.6% for other private investment).
B. Climate-tech startups are active in multiple sectors, and the patterns of how different groups of investors engage with these sectors demonstrate their varying priorities.
C. Public grants are most dominant in sectors with very few startups, with the six sec- tors with the highest percentage of public funding all including fewer than 60 startups (compared with an average of 145).
D. In each of these sectors, public grants account for at least 24% of investments (compared with 11% of investments overall).
E. This dominance is potentially due to less profitable markets or technologies that are more difficult to commercialize (for example, nuclear) and suggests that public grants fill a key role in the climate-tech ecosystem by funding sectors that are less popular with traditional equity and corporate investors.

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Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Our results indicate that corporate investment and other private investment are highly significant for startup outcomes, in terms of both success and failure, whereas public grants are not. Startups with at least one corporate investment exited at a rate 110% higher than those without corporate investment. ...

    Options:
    A. Similarly, startups with at least one investment from other private investors exited at a rate 150% higher than those without such investments.
B. Public grants also do not show any consistently significant effect when grantors were separated into national, subnational or international sources.
C. Similarly, Models 4 and 5 consist of startups that did or did not receive a corporate investment, respectively.
D. Table 2 summarizes the regression results for each model, with corporate investment, other private investment, public grants, patent count and location in a climate-tech 'hotspot' (that is, a location with a density of two climate-tech startups per 100,000 population or greater) as predictor variables.
E. Models 2 and 3 consist of startups that did or did not receive a public grant, respectively, which allows us to analyse how the presence of a public grant changes the effect of other investors and key variables.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We fill this gap by providing a model-based analysis of the EU ETS with a specific emphasis on the influence of actors' foresight horizon. The contribution of our work is threefold. ...

    Options:
    A. We first analyse the past: bringing together the impact of political reforms, the foresight of compliance actors and the role of external investors, we show which mix of those mechanisms could explain the observed strong rise in carbon prices.
B. We turn to the future: having understood the mechanisms that could plausibly have led to the observed increase in carbon prices, we explore in how far this positive development is vulnerable and potentially could be reversed.
C. We close with policy recommendations on how to secure the energy transition in light of our results.
D. Different publications furthermore suggest that the limited foresight of compliance actors contributed to low carbon prices.
E. To understand the role of foresight, one needs to consider that the EU ETS allows for almost unlimited forward bankability: any certificate not used today can be used in the future.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Figure 3 shows our modelling results on the impact of reforms and actors' foresight on carbon prices. First of all, one can see between period (1) and period (2), when the MSR reform was negotiated and implemented, actors presumably started to look further into the future. ...

    Options:
    A. When turning to period (1) before 2018, one notices that observed ETS prices are closer to the modelled prices for myopic actors than to the modelled prices for farsighted actors.
B. Secondly, Fig. 3 shows that the 'Fit for 55' package sharply increases the stringency of the EU ETS.
C. Optimal carbon prices (that is, obtained under the assumption of perfect foresight) to reach the new targets are substantially higher than those that were necessary for achieving previous goals.
D. In fact, modelled prices for the 'Fit for 55' targets for 2020-2023 are in the order of €70-90 tCO2-1, corresponding well to observed 2021-2023 prices on the EU ETS, thus supporting the hypothesis that actors have transitioned towards a more farsighted perspective.
E. To understand the role of foresight, one needs to consider that the EU ETS allows for almost unlimited forward bankability: any certificate not used today can be used in the future. Hence, expected future prices may have a strong influence on today's prices.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    These risks are examples of what can happen in the electricity sector. Any delay poses the risk of climate targets becoming out of reach or being reachable only at very high costs, as feasible roll-out rates can be limited, for example, due to the availability of skilled workers or production capacities. ...

    Options:
    A. Likewise, the required steeper carbon price in the long-term might increase the likelihood of a political backlash that dismantles the policy.
B. To illustrate the delayed action, we focus on the electricity sector.
C. The major problem we identify under the relapse to myopia is that, as seen in Fig. 7, delayed investments into wind capacity in turn delay the phase-out of coal power generation.
D. As illustrated in Fig. 7a, our modelling shows that myopia could massively slow down wind capacity expansion in the next ten years, with yearly investments reduced by a factor of three, compared with the cost-optimal (that is, perfect foresight) trajectory.
E. The missing wind power in combination with low carbon prices would strongly delay the phase-out of coal.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Although many studies have explored cost-reduction potentials using qualitative or quantitative methods, such as literature-based projections, expert elicitation, detailed cost breakdowns or learning and experience curves, results are limited to the respective application category and system configuration. For example, studies empha- sizing private passenger car electrification have shown that costs for key components such as batteries are expected to fall substantially and quickly, with increasing evidence that battery-electric vehicles will constitute the primary technology. ...

    Options:
    A. However, electrifying heavy commercial trucks, such as US Class 7/8 or European N2/N3, still poses a tremendous challenge, particularly due to altered require- ments limiting the transferability of passenger car findings.
B. The fast electrification of heavy road freight transport is pivotal in limiting global warming in line with the Paris Climate Agreement1-3.
C. This follows since heavy-duty vehicles (HDVs) contribute a noteworthy proportion of annual greenhouse gas emissions despite a low share in the vehicle stock.
D. Whereas the European Union has agreed on ambitious tail-pipe emissions reduction targets for newly sold HDVs of -43% by 2030, -65% by 2035 and -90% by 2040 (compared with 2019/2020), California has effectively imposed the phase out of conventional combustion trucks by 20366, with other US states expected to follow.
E. Similarly, China is anticipated to tighten its tail-pipe emis- sions reduction targets soon to comply with its near-zero emissions target by 2060.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Whereas cumulative production volumes may be the best-performing predictor of theoretical technology cost compared with others, findings are hard to generalize into policy decisions and anticipated timescales. In parallel, the underlying data and thus observed cost estimates implicitly assume a certain relevance of battery technology and fuel cells for future road freight transport or even other sectors. ...

    Options:
    A. This relevance may be expressed as growing cumulative investments, economies of scale, supply chain improvements, spill-over effects and material or production improvements that would not occur without this relevance.
B. To achieve battery system costs of approximately €2020150 kWh-1 as indicated by our regression to be achievable between 2028 (near market) and 2032 (scientific), cumulative production volumes must range from 1,300 GWh (near market) to 5,200 GWh (scientific).
C. This yields short-term compound annual growth rates (CAGRs) of 39-49%.
D. Those volumes may be feasible in the early 2030s if BETs take large market shares fast, given their head start in the early 2020s. Corresponding LRs would be around 16% (scientific) to 19% (near market). Falling below €2020100 kWh-1, as indicated by our regression to be achievable between 2039 (near market) and 2049 (scientific), would require up to 11,000 GWh (near market) or even 68,000 GWh (scientific), with the former being probably feasible within the late 2030s given that BETs comprise substantial market shares and long-term CAGRs of 25-29%.
E. Similarly, China is anticipated to tighten its tail-pipe emissions reduction targets soon to comply with its near-zero emissions target by 2060.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    The current effects of technical designs and material choices on costs and performance are well documented, with pre-series and commercial components disclosing real-world pricing or facilitating cost versus performance trade-off analyses35 and product tear downs. However, exact technical designs, materials and properties of next-generation components until 2050 are theoretical, remain highly uncertain and are only selectively available. ...

    Options:
    A. This impedes comprehensive techno-economic assessments for single technologies across 2020-2050.
B. To achieve battery system costs of approximately €2020150 kWh-1 as indicated by our regression to be achievable between 2028 (near market) and 2032 (scientific), cumulative production volumes must range from 1,300 GWh (near market) to 5,200 GWh (scientific).
C. The FC data sample consists N = 83 sources and exhibits an imbalance towards other sources, particularly limited upon near-market estimates, limiting the significance of cross-category outcomes.
D. Our findings indicate that methods and scenario considerations exert more pronounced effects on the results.
E. Furthermore, the impact of data harmonization is more accentuated, with harmonized values being lower than the original ones, indicating cost developments are too low (15-25%).

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Internationally there is a movement to achieve a just transition to renew- able energy sources, where just transition encompasses broad elements of energy justice beyond employment outcomes. Calls for a just transition necessarily recognize that new energy systems will be built on and potentially reproduce the winners and losers of existing energy systems. ...

    Options:
    A. Within current energy systems, groups at the spatial periphery are at high risk of having their energy needs under-recognized and procedurally neglected.
B. Many communities hosting new renewable energy developments, particularly Indigenous communities, face procedural injustices in the form of limited access to decision-making procedures for developments on their lands.
C. There is a need to better understand the spatial and socio-demographic characteristics of communities facing non-recognition in protections afforded by present day electricity retail regulations, wherein non-recognition refers to the needs of certain groups being neglected or ignored.
D. Australia is assumed to have achieved the goal of universal access to energy for all, with an electricity rate of 100%, but this presumed ubiquity belies persistent disparity in who experiences energy insecurity and where they reside.
E. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (prepay) customers in Australia's remote Northern Territory (NT) are more likely to experience 'self-disconnection' during temperature extremes, which climate change only makes more frequent.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Remote settlements and Indigenous settlements are more likely to be underserved on multiple metrics (model 6). Remote settlements are 18% more likely (vs urban and regional) to be underserved on mul- tiple metrics, and Indigenous settlements are 15% more likely (vs not majority Indigenous) to be underserved on multiple metrics (margins contrast, p = 0.000 for both). ...

    Options:
    A. Remote settlements and Indigenous settlements are less likely to have solar connection clarity and less likely to have clear and independent complaints processes (models 3 and 5).
B. Remote settlements are 38% less likely (vs urban and regional) to have solar connection clarity and 14% less likely to have clear complaints processes (margins contrast, p = 0.000 for both).
C. Indigenous settlements are 48% less likely to have solar connection clarity and 10% less likely to have complaints process clarity, compared with settlements that are not majority Indigenous (margins contrast, p = 0.000 for both).
D. For three of our dependent variables, we find that being in a non-remote settlement perfectly predicts success (models 1, 2 and 4).
E. That is, all settlements that are urban or regional have legally enforceable protections for all customers regarding life support, guaranteed service levels and disconnection reporting.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Internationally households wanting to install solar often face barriers to navigating the process for grid connection. Stakeholder engagements and prior Australian research identify these connection processes as an impediment facing remote and Indigenous communities attempting to take part in energy transition. ...

    Options:
    A. In Australia, distributors own the poles and wires and are responsible for the connection process.
B. Although some states and territories have overarching legal requirements for distributors to connect residential solar, these documents leave distributors with a high-to-moderate degree of discretion in permitting individual residential connections to networks.
C. In full discretion cases, there is no relevant regulation that specifies conditions under which distributed solar should be connected; in moderate discretion cases, a distributor is required to have a 'model standing offer' or equivalent that establishes the conditions under which solar would be connected.
D. Many smaller remote settlements are subject to network constraints and newly offered capacity allocations are oversubscribed in short order.
E. Some progress is being made in this regard, for example, in WA where the distributed network service provider Horizon Power has committed to a policy of no solar refusals by 2025.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    To promote an equitable energy transition, many governments have enacted policies to provide energy technologies at reduced or zero cost to low-income households. In Western countries, these policies often take the form of subsidies for home retrofits, heating-system and efficiency upgrades, and solar panels—with some policies, such as the US Inflation Reduction Act, covering 100% of costs for households below certain income thresholds. ...

    Options:
    A. However, even when goods and services are 'free', attracting qualified households can be difficult.
B. One strategy to address these challenges is peer referral.
C. We define peer referral narrowly to mean when existing programme participants provide names to the programme provider of others who might enrol; we exclude informal word-of-mouth.
D. Compared with other outreach strategies, peer referral can more efficiently find programme participants: referrers know eligibility requirements and can more readily identify qualified peers.
E. Peer referral also leverages social influence, a widely recognized driver of energy technology adoption that may be especially influential among low-to-moderate income (LMI) households.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Our findings show that adding behavioural interventions to a referral programme multiplies the effect of providing financial rewards alone. Incorporating an appeal to reciprocity and further simplifying the referral process generated 2.0 and 7.5 times as many referrals. ...

    Options:
    A. The control condition, on average, generated one referral from every 106 existing clients, while the reciprocity treatment led to one referral from every 52 clients, and reciprocity + simplification produced one referral for every 14 clients.
B. In this Article, we test strategies to improve take up of low-income solar programmes by increasing referrals from LMI solar adopters.
C. We do so in partnership with GRID Alternatives, the non-profit organization that administers the California Solar Initiative's Single-family Affordable Solar Homes (SASH) Program.
D. SASH provides rooftop photovoltaic (PV) systems at no cost to qualified LMI homeowners.
E. Though there are debates about how government funding should be spent on solar deployment programmes like SASHexist to address inequities in access to this technology.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We test reciprocity and simplification in a large, pre-registered randomized controlled field experiment. All California clients of the non-profit (N = 7,680) were randomized to receive one of three mailers highlighting the US$200 referral rewards programme (final N = 7,676). ...

    Options:
    A. The control condition mimicked the non-profit's standard approach: a postcard describing the US$200 contingent reward, with a toll-free number and website to provide referrals.
B. One explanation for the number of names generated in the reciprocity + simplification condition is that the slip provided space for three referrals, perhaps unintentionally signalling that nominating three people was the default expectation.
C. By contrast, the web form allowed one referral at a time (though it could easily be completed again).
D. Similarly, individuals who phoned in referrals may have done so as soon as one name came to mind.
E. Though there are debates about how government funding should be spent on solar deployment, programmes like SASHexist to address inequities in access to this technology.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Two primary considerations arise when evaluating supply-side policies. The first is the relative effectiveness of each policy type in reducing oil production and associated GHG emissions, which to date, has received limited empirical analysis. ...

    Options:
    A. The second pertains to the ancillary benefits and costs of each policy and how they are distributed across different communities.
B. In particular, oil extraction tends to be highly spatially concentrated in certain areas, employing a local workforce and generating air pollution impacting nearby residents.
C. Depending on how oil extraction is spatially located in relation to workers and households, different supply-side policies can have different aggregate and distributional consequences in terms of health benefits and labour-market impacts.
D. For example, for the same overall GHG emissions target, a policy that phases out more labour-intensive oil fields may have higher lost worker compensation than other policies.
E. Likewise, a policy that bans oil fields near where disadvantaged households reside may generate larger overall health benefits and health equity gains.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    This paper examines the effectiveness and distributional consequences of potential supply-side policies intended to phase out oil extraction across California. As the world's fifth-largest economy and the United States' seventh-largest oil-producing state, California provides a unique setting to study supply-side policies. ...

    Options:
    A. The state is cur- rently implementing some of the world's most ambitious climate policies with a statewide carbon-neutrality goal by 2045.
B. We develop spatially and temporally explicit pathways that reduce California's oil extraction in response to various supply-side interventions—well setbacks, excise tax and carbon tax—between 2020 and 2045.
C. Our approach has two components and is summarized in Fig. 1. For all oil fields in California (Fig. 1a), we first construct an empirically estimated model of crude oil-well entry (Fig. 1b), production and exit at the oil-field level to project how various supply-side policies and macroeconomic conditions affect oil production across California oil fields out to 2045.
D. In our second step, we insert field-level predictions of oil production from our empirical model into: (1) an air pollution model, InMAP (Intervention Model for Air Pollution), to characterize how air pollution emissions from oil fields disperse across the state and (2) an employment input-output model, IMPLAN, which uses fixed multipliers to quantify local employment changes in the oil-extraction sector ('direct'), in sectors that provide inputs to oil extraction ('indirect') and in sectors where these workers spend income ('induced').
E. Together, these components provide an empirically based analysis of how supply-side policies could alter not just oil production across oil fields but also the spatial distribution of health impacts from air pollution and employment across California.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Supply-side policies lower statewide crude oil production but with different temporal and spatial patterns. Setbacks applied to new wells, excise taxes applied per unit of production and carbon taxes applied per tonne of GHG emis- sions lead to continuous declines that outpace that of the BAU trajectory, albeit with different pathways. ...

    Options:
    A. In general, a setback and an excise tax result in lower oil production in each year when compared with a carbon tax that is calibrated to achieve the same 2045 GHG emissions target.
B. Supplementary Fig. 1 shows that the relationship between production costs and emissions intensities is not systematic.
C. As a result, the fields that reduce production under a carbon tax will be unique from the fields that reduce production under an excise tax that achieves an equivalent reduction in carbon emissions.
D. There is close correspondence between statewide oil production and emissions pathways.
E. Together, these components provide an empirically based analysis of how supply-side policies could alter not just oil production across oil fields but also the spatial distribution of health impacts from air pollution and employment across California.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Following Russia's military attack on Ukraine, the European Union (EU) and United States have imposed a large number of sanctions on Russia. The attack has also led to a negative supply shock of oil, partly because Russia's ability to export has been hampered by the lack of will to insure Russian ships3, but also due to industry prepa- ration for the upcoming EU oil import ban. ...

    Options:
    A. Together with surging post-pandemic demand, this has led to very high prices of transport fuels.
B. These include Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania and Sweden.
C. Such tax reductions have problematic consequences since they increase demand, thus making current supply even more scarce.
D. Some of the tax reduction will be attenuated by an increase in the underlying oil price, leading to increased profits for oil producers.
E. Here, we assess the magnitude of this effect using basic theory and empirical estimates from the oil sector.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    As an explicit aim of the tax cut is to shield consumers from increasing fuel costs, an alternative way to do so is to give general income transfers to people that correspond to the reduction in tax revenues that would result from a decreased fuel tax. From a welfare perspective, this is preferable since people can then choose how to use the money. ...

    Options:
    A. To the extent that the tax cut is supposed to appease particular groups, it is also possible to direct the income transfers to these groups.
B. Such options include giving money to all car owners (not based on their driving), giving money to particular regions where the population is more reliant on cars (for example, rural areas) or reimbursing the tax collected in a region or municipality to that same region or municipality.
C. Another rationale to uphold fuel taxes is to internalize climate damages from fossil fuel use (that is, Pigouvian taxes).
D. From the perspective of this Analysis, an additional effect of an income transfer is that a share smaller than one will be spent on fuel; hence, the increase in Russian oil profits will be smaller. How much smaller will be assessed quantitatively.
E. Here, we assess the magnitude of this effect using basic theory and empirical estimates from the oil sector.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    In the long term, supply is somewhat elastic and demand is rather elastic too. This is because producers have time to adjust their production and make some capacity investments. ...

    Options:
    A. Likewise, consumers can acquire new habits or find solutions based on a new fuel price, and those in the process of buying a new vehicle will take the fuel price into account.
B. This is the case illustrated in Fig. 1.
C. The grey lines show the demand from the EU and the rest of the world, respectively.
D. The black lines represent global demand and supply.
E. A tax reduction in the EU shifts the EU's demand outwards (dashed grey line). This in turn increases global demand by an equivalent amount (dashed black line).

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    A first retrospective analysis of the event by Busby et al. discusses the magnitude of the event and its causes, indicating that the total economic loss amounted to US$130 billion and that the outage of gas power plants was mainly responsible for the high deficits in power generation capacity. Wu et al. provide a power grid simulation to conduct a very detailed analysis of the 2021 event, and Doss-Gollin et al. have shown that lower temperatures than those in February 2021 have been observed in the past 71 years, and heating demand predicted from temperature data would also have been higher in the past, although the 2021 freeze event was comparably long. ...

    Options:
    A. These previous studies indicate a striking gap between the occurrence probability of such an event, its large-scale economic and social cost and the lack of winterization efforts.
B. However, none of these studies assessed whether the economic incentives for power companies to invest in winterization have been sufficient, when the 2021 event is put into a long-term climatic context.
C. As winterization was not strongly enforced by regulation in Texas, power generators had to rely on the incentives provided by the energy-only market to arrive at investment decisions.
D. These incentives consist mainly of regulated price spikes at the spot market when generation capacity is scarce.
E. Here we assess how revenues from winterization compare to its cost for power companies.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    In the following, we compare events in Februrary 2021 to the period 2004-2020, as the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) provides hourly data on system operation in this period. Furthermore, the values of loss of load, capacity failures and demand prediction in this section rely on our simulation and may, therefore, differ from ERCOT reports to some extent. ...

    Options:
    A. Because we focus on estimating the long-term frequency of such events, we did not aim to reproduce the February 2021 event in detail.
B. We find that the highest predicted demand in the February 2021 event was well above the highest load observed in winter in that period.
C. However, our estimate is in the range of observed extreme summer loads.
D. Besides leading to high electricity demand, the low temperatures also caused substantial outages of generation capacities.
E. As a result, loss of load occurred in 106 hours.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    At the time of the failure, temperatures at wind parks in Southern Texas were at the very lower end of the temperature range observed in the period 2004-2020. However, the average wind park temperature in Northern Texas when wind power plants started to fail was just below 0°C and well within the range of previously observed low temperatures. ...

    Options:
    A. On 13 February, when gas outages summed up to only 5GW, ERCOT already reported 13GW of wind capacity outages.
B. Our simulations of loss-of-load events using climate data from 71 years shows that the 2021 event was a record one.
C. In total, we estimate that eight other severe power deficit events would have occurred in the current system if it had existed from 1950 to 2021, assuming the climate conditions of 1950-2021.
D. The second largest power deficit event at 1.26TWh is predicted when using climate data from 1983, assuming installed generation capacities as in February 2021.
E. Furthermore, we observe 17 minor events.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    There is a need to better understand the extent of energy insecurity experienced by Australia's remote Indigenous communities, in particular the role that temperature plays in shaping energy insecurity. The vulnerabilities associated with energy insecurity vary spatially on the basis of underlying characteristics, which can be highly regionalized and locally specific. ...

    Options:
    A. Socio-economic, demographic and behavioural factors, as well as occupancy and structural characteristics (including the size, type and quality of housing stock and appliances), are all key drivers of energy consumption; while the prevailing temperature can affect the security of electricity supply due to the cost of heating or cooling.
B. The climate of the Northern Territory (NT) ranges from equatorial and tropical regions in the north to hot dry grassland regions in Central Australia.
C. Remote Indigenous communities in the NT are mostly off-grid and unregulated by the guidelines of the Australian Energy Regulator.
D. In a situation unusual in Australia, remote living residents prepay for access to electricity and regularly experience disconnection on non-payment.
E. Distant from Australia's urban centres and major electricity grids, these communities have long relied on diesel and gas-fired generators.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    For author V.N.D., who works on issues related to energy, housing and social justice in Central Australia, maintaining access to electricity during temperature extremes represents a complex suite of interrelated challenges: Older houses had solar hot water and pot belly stoves for the winter. We could collect wood and the sun heated the water. ...

    Options:
    A. The new houses built by the Government since the Intervention (in 2007) have electric hot water heaters and no pot belly stoves.
B. When the old houses were upgraded, pot belly stoves were removed.
C. Our houses don't have heating anymore.
D. Most residents don't have much money, so residents buy cheap fan heaters and air-cons.
E. The problem with these is that they are expensive to run.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Prepayment for electricity is uncommon in urban Australia. It is heavily regulated in most jurisdictions on the basis of concerns for wellbeing. ...

    Options:
    A. It remains disproportionately common in small and widely dispersed remote communities across the NT, Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia.
B. In the NT prepayment is not limited to urban town camps and remote communities.
C. It is also used in urban and regional settings, including Darwin, Palmerston, Nhulunbuy, Katherine, Tennant Creek and Alice Springs.
D. Many of these communities have prepaid electricity services as their only option for service provision.
E. There is considerable variation in the operation of services and available protections for prepayment consumers subnationally.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Previous literature analysing scenarios for achieving universal access to modern energy services have focused predominantly on electricity supply to assess the cost-effectiveness of alternative options to provide connections. There is a paucity of studies analysing clean cooking scenarios, particularly at a global scale. ...

    Options:
    A. Existing studies that focus on cooking access scenarios are limited in their representation of multiple cooking fuel use (fuel stacking), population heterogeneity and affordability constraints, which are critical to understanding whether people will regularly use new fuels or stoves after they acquire them.
B. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, data showed that efforts to provide clean fuels and stoves have been lagging far behind those aimed at extending electricity access.
C. A recent report claims that this sluggish progress in providing clean cooking access is costing the world more than US$2 trillion each year as a result of health impacts, productivity losses and environmental degradation.
D. Mounting evidence of the impacts of air pollution exposure on COVID-19 mortality makes universal access to clean cooking services more urgent.
E. Despite this, emerging evidence suggests that the economic fallout of the pandemic might pose a further setback to efforts to reach this goal, as many are forced to climb down the energy ladder.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    In what follows, we define clean cooking as cooking with modern fuels such as liquid petroleum gas (LPG), electricity and piped gas, which when used in modern stoves result in little to no household pollution. Newer options, for example, bioethanol or solar electric, might become viable in the future, but were not included in our analysis as we detected no use of these in the empirical datasets that we employed. ...

    Options:
    A. All other fuels, including solid biomass-based firewood or charcoal and coal, are categorized as polluting, because prevailing stove technologies that use these result in pollution levels that exceed World Health Organization indoor air quality guidelines for household fuel combustion.
B. We categorize a household as cooking poor if it depends on polluting cooking fuels, that is, on fuels other than those we define as clean, for half or more of its cooking energy consumption.
C. In our analysis we compared an especially constructed COVID-19 recovery scenario (COVID) with three reference scenarios, namely sustainability (SSP1), middle-of-the-road (SSP2) and regional rivalry (SSP3), from the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSP) framework.
D. We further compared our recovery and reference scenarios with a set of scenarios that impose an ambitious climate mitigation policy that limits warming to 2°C by the end of the century (CP2C) using a previous formulation that assumes a regionally differentiated carbon price trajectory that rises gradually over time.
E. Despite this, emerging evidence suggests that the economic fallout of the pandemic might pose a further setback to efforts to reach this goal, as many are forced to climb down the energy ladder.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Clear differences in the pace and nature of the transition in cooking fuels across regions are evident. In rural CPA in the COVID scenario, we see most households with very low incomes per capita (approximately less than US$5 per capita per day). ...

    Options:
    A. We see a transition from high firewood dependence at lower income levels to almost equal shares of firewood, gas and electricity at the highest income levels.
B. Households with middle-income levels could still rely mostly on biomass fuels.
C. By contrast, among urban households, income per capita levels are higher (up to approximately US$17 per capita per day).
D. These households are likely to depend mostly on gas and electricity.
E. The pattern varies greatly across other regions, even at comparable income levels.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Consumer satisficing is problematic enough when consumers are choosing between contracts competing only on price. This problem may be compounded if consumers are being asked to choose between diverse contracts created by utility business model innovation. ...

    Options:
    A. Yet, there has been little work to explore the types of utility energy contracts consumers are likely to opt for when presented with a range of possible offers.
B. This is the problem we address in this study.
C. We explicitly assume that utility companies and their consumers are operating under uncertainty, searching for satisfac- tory strategies in the market, and that these decisions will evolve with each other to affect the direction and outcomes of energy transitions.
D. To explore this relationship, we define the business models that utilities are exploring to respond to the pressures of a low-carbon transition and which contractual attributes they might offer consumers, and test how consumers respond to these new business models, and which consumers prefer which new contracts.
E. We then use the results to explore the implications of these data on energy transitions and market regulation.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We adopted a collaborative business model innovation process to explore how utility business models can evolve to meet the challenges of a low-carbon transition. We followed Rohrbeck et al., who used this approach to support collaborative business model generation in the German utilities sector. ...

    Options:
    A. The workshop was undertaken on 15 June 2016 with 38 industry, academic and government stakeholders.
B. We identified 11 future utility business model archetypes that responded to a hierarchy of threats to the current utility business model.
C. We use the term archetype to describe a new utility business model. Rohrbeck et al. suggested that collaborative business model generation is done in three stages: (1) idea gen- eration; (2) prioritization; and (3) validation.
D. As this research was time constrained to a one-day workshop, we used a project steering group, comprising three utility executives, two infrastructure consultants and two energy financiers drawn from the Energy Research Partnership, for initial idea generation and took these ideas on utility business models for further development in the workshop.
E. We then use the results to explore the implications of these data on energy transitions and market regulation.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We then identified energy consumer segments based on consumers' likelihood of adopting the new energy contracts. Segmentation studies have been used to identify different types of consumer in relation to household electricity storage, acceptance of demand control, energy conservation behaviours or acceptance of smart grids. ...

    Options:
    A. Some studies have used measured or metred consumption data combined with only basic household and building character- istics to identify groups of energy-consuming households.
B. The cluster analysis identified four groups individually representing between 16 and 35% of the sample.
C. The groups were profiled using the variables used to create them as well as other factors, such as demographic characteristics and current energy use.
D. Profiling consisted of characterizing each segment individually using descriptive statistics as well as comparisons with the other segments using measures of variance and association.
E. Each of these segments was given a short name and a representative narrative statement.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Moreover, although repowering activity to date has been concentrated in a few markets and driven by relatively unique policy incentives, by the late 2020s repowering could become a primary source of business activity for the wind industry across Europe, North America and China, and a key to optimizing wind energy utilization in the context of energy transition. Today, only a few countries have wind energy fleets that support substantial repowering activity. ...

    Options:
    A. In this context, empirically derived insights from repowering activities are increasingly informative.
B. Denmark is a prime case for analysis: wind energy has emerged as the primary electricity production technology, having reached a 47% market share in 2019, and it features the oldest wind turbine fleet in the world.
C. Further factors that contribute to a robust repowering market in Denmark are the size of the country, with its consequent space limitations, and its continued desire to expand wind energy production.
D. Further, subsidy schemes and short-term market incentives may encourage repowering, and include incentive programmes directed at repowering, market premiums for new projects or favourable tax policy.
E. Recent repowering in the United States, for example, was predominantly driven by the ability to requalify for full value and tenure of the production tax incentive programme.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We propose a more holistic and socially informed perspective on repowering based on comprehensive project-level information. Specifically, this approach considers multifaceted drivers for repowering decisions and hence identifies dismantled turbines that are located at the same site as the new development project (on-site) as well as existing turbines in other locations that need dismantling so new turbines can be installed, that is, we considered all the activity that can be conditionally associated with the repowering project, regardless of spatial or temporal proximity between the existing and the new turbines, as illustrated in Fig. 1. ...

    Options:
    A. We then identified categories for dismantling reasons in repowering projects, especially for those turbines physically located outside the immediate project development site (off-site).
B. Applying our approach to Denmark as an empirical case, we quantified repowering projects in their entirety.
C. Through data collection from municipal plans, project publications, geospatial analysis and semi-structured interviews with developers covering 91% of all dismantled capacity in repowering projects, we identified the full breadth of repowering projects and determined dismantling reasons.
D. We revealed several notable differences between the traditional on-site and our more holistic and socially informed repowering perspective.
E. Our work emphasizes that a pure technology perspective alone cannot explain implementation pathways and must be supplemented with the political and social dimensions.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    The second major individual reason for dismantling turbines in repowering is a violation of the cumulative noise emissions, which comprises 13% of the total number of turbines and 8% of the full capacity dismantled. Hence, noise regulation in Denmark has a considerable impact on repowering projects. ...

    Options:
    A. This impact was also underlined by several of the interviewees.
B. Here, it is relevant to note that noise regulation differs from country to country.
C. Through data collection from municipal plans, project publications, geospatial analysis and semi-structured interviews with developers covering 91% of all dismantled capacity in repowering projects, we identified the full breadth of repowering projects and determined dismantling reasons.
D. Interestingly, turbines removed because of noise have the smallest average capacity size (435kW) and highest average age (22.1 years).
E. Our work emphasizes that a pure technology perspective alone cannot explain implementation pathways and must be supplemented with the political and social dimensions.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    We propose a conceptual framework for understanding how different features of social information programmes impact energy conservation that can be articulated in a set of hypotheses, illustrated in Fig. 1. First, the effectiveness of a normative message is maximized by the inclusion of consistent feedback of different types (that is, injunctive and descriptive). ...

    Options:
    A. Second, when injunctive and descriptive feedbacks are in contrast, the strength of each single piece of information matters.
B. The strength of the normative feedback may depend on several factors highlighted in the literature, from the recipient's beliefs on what relevant others think is socially approved of to the degree of consensus or ambiguity around the norm conveyed by the information.
C. In our setting, we hypothesize that the effect of the descriptive information increases according to the difference between an individual's electricity consumption and the average consumption of the reference group.
D. The effect of injunctive information instead varies according to the strength of social approval conveyed through visual cues and encouragement messages.
E. Third, additional pieces of consistent feedback of the same type produce smaller saving.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A


Question:
You are given the start of a paragraph from a scientific research paper, ending in "...". Choose the most coherent continuation from the options below.

    Query:
    Our setting consists of a randomized controlled trial implemented by an Italian energy company that provides almost half-a-million households with information on their electricity use relative to that of their neighbours. The social information is included in a Home Energy Report distributed to customers via email (eHER). ...

    Options:
    A. The programme was rolled out in 2016 and involved 464,523 customers (n=418,178 treatment, n=46,345 control).
B. The core feature of the eHER is the neighbour comparison, which combines descriptive and injunctive normative information.
C. The descriptive norm graphically compares the customer's electricity use over the previous month with the average use in two reference groups: 100 similar customers who live nearby (that is, neighbours) and the 15% most-efficient neighbours.
D. The injunctive norm takes the form of thumbs-up symbols next to the descriptive norm graph: three thumbs up ('excellent') for users who consume within the top 15% most-efficient neighbours, two thumbs up ('good') for those more efficient than the average neighbour and one thumbs up ('you can do better') for the others.
E. Figures 2 shows the eHER for users receiving three and two thumbs up, respectively.

Answer with the letter (A-E) corresponding to the best continuation. **Strictly follow this format—do not include any explanations or additional text.**

Answer: A