MIT centers, laboratories, departments and programs provide a multi-faceted approach to solving the world's energy challenge.
Modeling, simulation
and complex systems
Simulation of complex systems has evolved into a research discovery tool but has not yet been employed to the degree called for in many energy technology development areas. Such models and simulations, drawing upon the dramatic scale up of computational power and associated architectures and algorithmic innovation, can address complex systems with many degrees of freedom and with multiple length and time scales of interest. These system characteristics are important for many energy technology challenges. They are crucial for characterizing natural systems such as the atmosphere, ocean, biosphere couplings crucial for understanding climate and for social systems such as the global economy and its response to energy and environmental policy change or the dynamics of emerging "gigacities." Advancing the methodologies for analyzing and simulating complex nonlinear systems will be important for avoiding the unintended consequences that so often arise when energy issues are addressed in isolation from complex technical, policy, social and behavioral feedbacks.
