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TSEC-BIOSYS: Shaping the Future Bioeconomy

www.tsec-biosys.ac.ukTheme 3:

Roland Clift Damiete Ogunkunle

Philip Sinclair

Centre for Environmental Strategy, University of SurreyBiomass role in the UK energy futures

The Royal Society, London: 28th & 29th July 2009

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Sustainable developmentand sustainability

• Sustainable development meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs (WCED, 1987)

• Sustainable development involves participatory processes of interaction between the human economy, society and the environment (Mitchell et al, 2004)

• Sustainability is the possibility that humans and other life flourish on the Earth forever (Ehrenfeld, 2008)

• “Acid” test of a sustainable development framework: does it aid processes which support sustainable development to come into being?

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TSEC Biosys

Multi-Criterion Decision Analysis(MCDA)

• Discrete, qualitative criteria and options for a decision are elicited from participants

• Learning leads to comparisons• Various methods are used to construct a view of

decision maker preferences consistent with a certain set of assumptions (e.g. reference level, value measurement, outranking; Belton and Stewart, 2002; Keeney and Raiffa, 1976)

• Areas of ignorance are recognised; uncertainties are due to the consequences of the incompleteness and fallibility of knowledge

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Scenarios:

“… plausible descriptions of how the future may develop, based on a coherent and internally consistent set of assumptions (“scenario logic”) about key relationships and driving forces…”

(Nakicenovic et al., UNDP, 2000)

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TSEC Biosys

Characteristics of Biomass as an Energy Source:

Versatile but this means:• Multiple possible supply chains• Multiple possible uses • Different possible scales of implementation• No established infrastructure or market

i.e. both more complex and more complicated than other primary energy sources, with much scope for confusion of policy…

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TSEC Biosys

Bioenergy: scales of operation

RCEPRCEPscenariosscenarios

Geographical and temporal scales for bioenergy technologies, comparative activities and scenarios (after Connors, 2007)

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Narratives

• Methods have been devised for writing narratives from qualitative systems models (e.g., Hector et al, 2007)

• Within this project, this method has been tested for the UK bioenergy system in a “narrative workshop”

• The evaluation of a narrative depends on the “decision frame” of the reader. The frame that a reader adopts is controlled partly by the content of the narrative and partly by the norms, habits and personal characteristics of the reader (Tversky and Kahneman, 1981).

• A set of narratives from this workshop, written for different audiences, are in evaluation with a range of different readers

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Systematic Process to Construct Narratives:

1. Workshop to: identify influences;

construct qualitative system model.

2. Use system model as a basis for writing “narratives” to explain options and possible scenarios and to inform quantitative modelling.

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TSEC Biosys

An example of a Trilemma - “The Archers Trilemma”

ECO-CENTRISM

SOCIAL EQUITY

FREE-MARKET CAPITALISM

SD

Ideals Avarice

Eco-system services

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TSEC Biosys

The Trilemma System Map

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Evaluation of this approach:

The effectiveness of the narratives is proven if

• (a) their informational content is consistent irrespective of the narrator

• (b) the learning of the reader is independent of the writing of the narrators

• EFFICIENCY – Very time-consuming…

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TSEC Biosys

Future Directions

• Apply this approach to structuring other problems characterised by a large number of diverse influences and forces.

• Use qualitative and quantitative models to inform each other.

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Biomass Resources for Heat

Utopia Dystopia

Forestry biomass

Forestry biomass

Utopia

DystopiaWaste

biomass

Waste biomassUtopia

Dystopia

Agriculture

biomass

Agriculture

biomass

Ecosystem services

Rural economic development

“Likely” future

“Desirable” future

“As-Is”

Forestry products (available for energy)Forestry residuesClean wood industrial by-products

Organic Fraction of Municipal Solid Waste (OFMSW)Sewage sludgeCommercial industrial waste (mainly F&D industry)Other industrial co-products (e.g. black liquor)

Energy crops (woody and grassy)Agricultural residues (straw and other)

Waste minimisation

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TSEC Biosys Interaction between

qualitative and quantitative (MARKAL) modelling:

Qualitative system models define the systems, i.e. supply chains and uses, to be represented in the MARKAL model scenarios.

Narratives condense the outcome of the MARKAL scenarios in a way which (should) make(s) them intelligible to a non-specialist (and possibly non-quantitative) audience

– SEE EXAMPLES