Variants

Each variant closes a deficit and states what closing it costs elsewhere. The Secretariat prepares them and in no case chooses among them.

Article 90(4): the variants and the assumptions on which each rests are published.

Article 98(3): where the Congress fails to reconcile, it decides by vote of its delegates, publishes the dissenting positions, and states the reasons for the choice made among the variants.

Closes the deficit through

Variant A: shorten hours

Care hours met: 100%
General weekly hours: -1.5 h
Materials: unchanged

Meets the care deficit by reducing the general ceiling on hours and moving the released labour into residential care. Article 116 governs the rotation of arduous tasks.

Variant B: defer overhauls

Care hours met: 100%
Rail availability: -4%
Materials: -2.1%

Meets the care deficit from the labour released by deferring rail overhauls. The Commissioner for Future Generations has published an observation on deferred maintenance.

Variant C: reduce steel programme

Steel deficit closed: yes
Dwellings: -3.4 k
Emissions: -1.2%

Closes the steel deficit by reducing the construction programme. The reduction falls on dwellings, which the order of priority ranks above most other uses.

Variant D: import against the budget

Steel deficit closed: yes
Emissions: +0.9%
Budget headroom: -0.9%

Closes the steel deficit by import. Materials and energy embodied in imports count against the same budget, so the headroom falls by the same quantity.

Assumptions published with each

Every variant above is published with the assumptions it rests upon: the rate at which released labour transfers between sectors, the availability consequences of a deferred overhaul, and the emissions factor applied to imported steel. An assumption is a figure the Secretariat has chosen, so each is stated separately from the computation and may be contested on its own.

Objections to an assumption are answered in writing before a round concludes, as Article 97(2) requires.

Variants withdrawn

Variants prepared and afterwards withdrawn in this cycle.
Variant	Reason for withdrawal
Meeting the care deficit by extending shift lengths in residential care	Withdrawn. Arduous tasks carry a duty of rotation and of reduced exposure, and the variant increased both.
Meeting the steel deficit by drawing on the reserve	Withdrawn. The reserve is fixed by the Congress and the Secretariat prepares no variant that presupposes a decision reserved to another body.
Closing the water deficit by raising the abstraction ceiling	Withdrawn. The ceiling belongs to the Ecological Budget Authority and Article 26(2) voids a plan exceeding it.

A withdrawn variant remains published with the reason, so that the record shows what was considered and why it was set aside.