Frontiers in Sustainability Science: Biofuels as a Critical Test

该提案支持举办一个研讨会，审议美国农业生态系统和受管理的自然生态系统生物燃料生产的可持续性。研讨会的最大目标是利用生物燃料生产带来的挑战来促进可持续性科学的进步，重点是理论框架和分析工具。研讨会将强调该问题的跨学科性质，汇集生物学家、经济学家、社会科学家和工程师。 评估美国生物燃料生产可持续性的最大挑战之一在于开发分析工具和模型，以便在技术和环境可能迅速变化的情况下重新评估可持续性。推进生物燃料生产和更广泛的可持续性科学研究将需要在开发跨学科综合预测模型的能力方面取得重大新进展。研讨会有可能激发新的跨学科合作，以提高科学界评估广泛人类活动可持续性的能力。 鉴于生物燃料生产的发展速度非常快，讲习班将重点放在生物燃料生产的可持续性问题上，这对公共政策具有重要影响。讲习班将侧重于提高公众对可持续性各方面的认识的方法，以及与生物燃料生产的可持续性有关的具体问题。研讨会的具体目标之一是向NSF提供关于如何促进可持续性分析基础进步的建议。

This proposal supports a workshop to consider the sustainability of biofuel production from both agricultural ecosystems and managed natural ecosystems in the United States. The most general goal of the workshop is to use the challenges presented by biofuel production to stimulate advances in the science of sustainability, focusing on both theoretical frameworks and analytical tools. The workshop will stress the interdisciplinary nature of the issue, bringing together biologists, economists, social scientists, and engineers. One of the greatest challenges in assessing the sustainability of biofuel production in the U.S. lies in developing analytical tools and models that allow reassessment of sustainability in the face of potentially rapid change in both technology and the environment. Advancing research in biofuel production and in sustainability science more generally will require significant new developments in the ability to develop predictive models that integrate across diverse disciplines.The workshop has the potential to stimulate new interdisciplinary collaboration to improve the ability of the scientific community to assess the sustainability of a wide range of human activities. The focus of the workshop on the subject of the sustainability of biofuel production has important public policy implications, given the extraordinary pace of developments in this area. The workshop will focus on approaches to improving public understanding of the dimensions of sustainability, and the specific issues associated with sustainability of biofuel production. One of the workshop's specific goals is to provide recommendations to NSF on ways to foster advances in the foundations for analysis of sustainability.