Example: Different Orders for Complete Policy Simulation

Then the Policy run contains 4 annual simulations, namely those for the years 2000 to 2003. Here we suppose that the Base Rerun is being done. The Rerun of the base will also contain 4 annual simulations, for years 2000 to 2003.

Of course it is not possible to solve the Rerun or the Policy for any year until the Base has been solved for that year.

Clearly the first three annual simulations which must be carried out are those of the Base for years 1998, 1999 and 2000. Once the Base case has been solved for year 2000, it is possible to solve either the Base for year 2001 or to solve the Rerun or the Policy for year 2000. This leads to the two main alternative orders for carrying out the complete policy simulation. Either

1. aim to complete all years of the Base, then all years of the Rerun and then all years of the Policy. [Complete Base First]

2. as soon as a year of the Base is solved, go on to complete the same year for the Rerun and Policy. [Complete Policy Years as soon as possible]

With the first strategy [Complete Base First], the order of the annual simulations is as shown below. [Here go from left to right across each row, then going on to the next row.]

	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003
Base	1	2	3	4	5	6
Rerun	x	x	7	8	9	10
Policy	x	x	11	12	13	14

With the second strategy [Complete Policy Years ASAP], the order of the annual simulations is as shown below. [Here go down the columns as soon as possible.]

	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003
Base	1	2	3	6	9	12
Rerun	x	x	5	8	11	14
Policy	x	x	4	7	10	13

Note that, within any one year, the Base is done first, then the Policy and the Rerun is last.

With the Complete Base First strategy, the Spreadsheet jobs are done immediately following the last annual simulation for the corresponding multi-year simulation. [For example, the Spreadsheet job for the Policy is done immediately after the Policy simulation for year 2003.]

With the Complete Policy Years ASAP strategy, the Spreadsheet jobs are done after all annual simulations for all three multi-year runs have been completed. And the Spreadsheet jobs are done in the order first Rerun, then Policy and finally Base. [In the example above, the Spreadsheet job for the Rerun is done after the 2003 Base simulation.]

By default, the software uses the second strategy [Complete Policy Years ASAP]. You can change to the Complete Base First strategy using menu item Complete Base First from the Run Preferences menu.