New this term, University of Waterloo graduate students will discuss their complex systems work during a monthly seminar. Join us for a 20 minute talk, followed by a 20-minute discussion and feedback opportunity. Afterwards, everyone who is able is welcome to meet at the Graduate House for food and socializing from 6 p.m. onward.
This month, Jude H. Kurniawan talks about 'Visualizing different perspectives of energy scenarios' on Thursday, May 16 from 4:30-5:30 in EV3 3401. We hope to see you there!
Visualizing different perspectives of energy scenarios
Jude H. Kurniawan (presenter) and Vanessa J. Schweizer
Studies of energy futures could provide roadmaps toward low-carbon energy transitions. However, many organizations conduct energy futures studies independently producing numerous energy scenarios that project vastly different futures. Stories produced by these scenarios might be very different and it will be challenging to know which scenarios we should base our decisions upon. Here we apply network analysis to visualize different perspectives of four Canadian energy futures reports. This provides an approach to ‘harmonize’ their stories. Network analysis can visualize the structures of these studies and what portion of a multi-study network each study occupies. We found studies to vary in scope, which may motivate their key findings (focussing either on the economy or the environment). Further, we subjected the full network to community detection to reveal groups of drivers that might be significant for Canadian low-carbon energy transitions. Our findings show that some drivers that are important at the global level are less significant for Canada. Some energy sub-sectors (such as transport and freight) are especially important for Canada.