From Social Simulation to Integrative System Design

As the recent financial crisis showed, today there is a strong need to gain "ecological perspective" of all relevant interactions in socio-economic-techno-environmental systems. For this, we suggested to set-up a network of Centers for integrative systems design, which shall be able to run all potentially relevant scenarios, identify causality chains, explore feedback and cascading effects for a number of model variants, and determine the reliability of their implications (given the validity of the underlying models). They will be able to detect possible negative side effect of policy decisions, before they occur. The Centers belonging to this network of Integrative Systems Design Centers would be focused on a particular field, but they would be part of an attempt to eventually cover all relevant areas of society and economy and integrate them within a "Living Earth Simulator". The results of all research activities of such Centers would be turned into informative input for political Decision Arenas. For example, Crisis Observatories (for financial instabilities, shortages of resources, environmental change, conflict, spreading of diseases, etc.) would be connected with such Decision Arenas for the purpose of visualization, in order to make complex interdependencies understandable to scientists, decision-makers, and the general public.Comment: 34 pages, Visioneer White Paper, see http://www.visioneer.ethz.c

A Concept of Innovation Hub for Smart Applications, Enabling Pro-active Approach to Urban Policy and Planning Processes

In recent years, the question of how to develop smart applications in environments where solutions already exist has become a challenge for many trends of technological transformation e.g. in industry, transport or smart cities. The latter trend is additionally very sensitive because of the social dimension of the impact of transformation, where the human being should be in the centre of attention. In this paper we present the concept of the Innovation Hub in Poznań, which is a framework for digital transformation focused on integration and development towards proactive digital city system. Starting from the pillars of the digital transformation, i.e. the City Development Strategy and existing well-functioning smart city components, we justify the evolutionary model of transformation by creating favorable conditions for the implementation of Proof of Concept projects with the active participation of residents. In addition, we point out examples of projects that were linked to decision-making processes

Investigating the peculiarities of sustainable energy policies in islands communities for smart grid development: insights from complexity science and agent based models

Initiatives and projects ranging from European islands to the Falklands and the Pacific Fiji islands are implementing renewable energy sources. They not only address the unique features of islands but also to reduce the economic vulnerability of small island states and in some cases, regenerate depopulated island communities and enhance socio-economic and ecological sustainability. Islands are often regarded as laboratories for, or precursors of, wider energy transitions and the “smart grid” innovation makes no exception. The “smart grid” is an umbrella term that covers modernization of both the transmission and active distribution grids and the different competing smart grid architectures could transform the electricity industry and the relations with consumers and prosumers. This paper asks two – relatively simple – questions: are there any socio-technical energy systems and dominant designs more prone to emerge depending on the topologies and scale of islands? How far can we learn and scale up lessons from the studies of island energy communities that are useful in other Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) with greater scale and interconnectivity? This exploratory paper is part of on-going research project (CASCADE) to model smart grids as Agent Based Systems embracing concepts and techniques from Complexity Science. There are three key objectives. The paper initially summarizes the key particuliarities of island energy systems, including the scale and boundaries to the socio-technical system that combine to determine the appropriateness of different energy responses, balancing and optimizing the various combinations of distributed renewable generation, energy storage (including plug-in cars), and loads. From this, a provisional conceptual model will be presented which identifies the range of factors that (re)configure to influence the potential dissemination of new energy technologies within island communities and the range of agents that influence that process. The paper will build on an expanding literature on modelling societal transitions with cognitive agents and agent transformation to justify our modelling choices. Central to the question is how to represent the cognitive agents and their adoption of new technologies and adaptation patterns.Validation may benefit from data from the Bornholm smartgrid case and other case studies

Utilizing Urban Living Laboratories for Social Innovation

Cities have long been recognized as potential hubs of knowledge, social and cultural diversity, jobs, education, public services, and infrastructure. Alongside these opportunities, however, cities also face a changing climate, reduced availability of raw materials and natural resources, and dwindling physical space for the built environment. These challenges are accompanied by increasing disparities in income and resultant social inequalities; mounting threats to human health, well-being, and food security; growing refugee and migration influxes; and demographic changes. These concerns and associated governance challenges increase the urgency for new socially, ecologically, and culturally sensitive approaches to urban development. Such approaches need not only to reduce human vulnerability and environmental footprints, but also to build social cohesion and support ecological sustainability, cultural integration, and the establishment of a shared identity between citizens within a just system of distribution and access to urban resources and wealth

Modelling and Simulation of Complex Adaptive System: The Diffusion of Socio-Environmental Innovation in the RENDRUS Network

Socio-environmental innovation is a process of social change that implies both the participation of agents on social and environmental initiatives and the generation and diffusion of relevant information, which lead social transformations for collective benefit. During the diffusion of socio-environmental innovations through a communication network, the information is created and shared among participants until mutual understanding is reached. In the case of National Network for Sustainable Rural Development (RENDRUS) network, getting innovations adopted is very difficult by people in rural communities due to the lack of effective communication channel. This study aims to develop a novel agent-based simulation model of socio-environmental innovation diffusion in the RENDRUS network based on complex adaptive systems approach. First, the conceptual model of socio-environmental innovation diffusion in the RENDRUS network based on complexity approach is developed. Then, an agent-based simulation model is implemented using Netlogo software, followed by the simulation model analysis and the design of plausible simulation scenarios. The simulation results illustrate how S-curve emerges from the interrelationships between agents considering endogenous and social cohesion effects. The conclusions argue that more social cohesion and popularity of socio-environmental innovations between small rural producers and their organizations, governmental institutions, academic institutions and the knowledge society corresponds to less time to adopt socio-environmental innovations

A Framework to Analyze Data Governance of Swiss Population Registers

In June 2006 the Swiss Parliament adopted a new law on population registers' harmonization in order to simplify statistical data collection and data exchange from around 4'000 decentralized registers. Besides there are more than 2'000 administrative services delivered to Swiss citizens and businesses, of which hundreds could potentially use data from population registers. The law is rather vague about the implementation of this harmonization and even though many projects are currently being undertaken in this domain, most of them are quite technical. We believe there is a need for analysis tools and therefore in this paper we propose a conceptual framework to analyse data governance of these populations registers, with a strong focus on information requirements and identity management. In order to develop this framework we built on existing approaches to define its building blocks: data consumers, data sources, identity in a given context, requirements, and data sets.governance; data; identity; population registers; modelling; framework

Treatment and valorization plants in materials recovery supply chain

Aim of industrial symbiosis is to create synergies between industries in order to exchange resources (by-products, water and energy) through geographic proximity and collaboration [1]. By optimizing resource flows in a “whole-system approach”, a minimization of dangerous emissions and of supply needs can be achieved. Resources exchanges are established to facilitate recycling and re-use of industrial waste using a commercial vehicle. Several paths can be identified in order to establish an industrial symbiosis network (Figure 1, left), in relation (i) to the life cycle phase (raw material, component, product) and (ii) to the nature (material, water, energy) of the resource flows to be exchanged. Sometimes by-products and/or waste of an industrial process have to be treated and valorized in order to become the raw materials for others. In particular, two main treatment processes can be identified: refurbishment/upgrade for re-use (Figure 1, center) and recycling for material recovery (Figure 1, right). A brief overview of technological and economic aspects is given, together with their relevance to industrial symbiosis