On 28 April 2017, I gave a presentation at the Hakozaki Campus of Kyushu University to launch Kyushu University’s new series of inter-disciplinary colloquia. The aim of these events is to promote exchange among faculty and students from across the university (especially in the humanities and social sciences).
My presentation was entitled “Incorporating Quantitative Equity into Energy Policy Decision Making“
概要:
To date, evaluation of energy policies, and recommendations for future energy strategy have been almost exclusively based on economic and environmental efficacy analyses. This approach to evaluation ignores the critical third pillar of sustainability, the social aspects. The reason that social aspects have been overlooked is likely because their definition and quantification have proven difficult, leading to a mostly qualitative approach in terms of amenity, and other subjective aspects. This research addresses this gap and proposes an ‘Energy Policy Sustainability Evaluation Framework’ which, through jurisdiction-specific hearings, identifies critical social equity factors which can be quantified, and therefore combined (and contrasted with) economic and environmental outcomes in order to provide a decision-making tool for sustainable energy policies into the future. The framework has been applied to national level policy assessment and scenario development, coal-RE energy system shift decision making, and is currently being applied to an international equity and RE deployment comparison using World Bank Development Indicators to assess nations on a level playing field. This presentation will describe the reasoning behind the development of this tool, equity factor establishment, potential applications, and some of the interesting results gained to date.
Thank you to all the attendees, and I look forward to future interaction and collaboration.