Innovations at the Nexus of Food, Energy, and Water Systems (INFEWS: U.S.-China): A multi-scale integrated modeling approach to managing the transition to sustainability

随着全球人口增加到75亿甚至更多，人们越来越关注地球在粮食、水和能源系统（FEWS）等多个相互作用方面的承载能力。该项目的首要目标是通过实现可持续性所需的权衡的多因素评估，实现向可持续的FEWS的过渡。该项目将在普渡大学和三个中国学术机构（能源与环境政策研究中心、水文水资源与水利工程国家重点实验室和中国农业政策研究中心）之间建立一个美中合作的虚拟研究中心（FEWS-VRC）。FEWS-VRC将在两个方向上推动定量系统可持续性分析的前沿：1)通过扩大对农业生产与土地-水利用耦合的网格模型的使用来评估异质性的作用；2)分析农业与新能源，特别是生物能源之间的相互作用。开发的工具将建立在科学门户平台（FEWS- hub）上，该平台将为解决关键的未来研究和规划问题提供一个定量的、可扩展的基础，从而提高世界上两个最大经济体在FEWS主题方面的决策能力。通过综合评估方法，该项目将在几个方面增加现有知识：农业生产的网格化建模；并将网格化农业模型与详细的一般均衡模型耦合。国家层面的空间模型过于粗糙，无法处理农业生产的异质性。此外，随着水越来越成为农业的制约因素，将农业生产与流域尺度的水文模型联系起来至关重要。这项研究的一个预期结果是建立一个框架来评估网格级异质性的重要性，以及与水资源可用性相关的潜在“热点”。第二个目标是将普渡大学开发的ENVISAGE模型与SIMPLE-G模型相结合，从而将后者模型扩展到包括能源系统。ENVISAGE是一个具有大型能源子模块的综合评估模型，可对生物能源的变化进行评估，包括对土地利用的影响。将这两个完全不同的模型结合起来，将允许在一个可处理和可跟踪的框架中解决新的研究问题。可持续发展是全球公认的重大挑战问题，因此提高FEWS框架的观测和预测能力将对粮食、水、能源和国家安全产生积极影响。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

As global population rises to 7.5 billion people and beyond, concern is growing about the planet's carrying capacity across the multiple and interacting dimensions of food, water and energy systems (FEWS). The overarching goal of this project is to enable the transition to sustainable FEWS by achieving the multi-factorial assessment of tradeoffs needed to achieve sustainability. This project will build a U.S.- China collaboration framed as a Virtual Research Center (FEWS-VRC) between Purdue University and three Chinese academic institutions (Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research, State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering, and Center for Chinese Agricultural Policy). FEWS-VRC will push the frontier of quantitative systems sustainability analysis in two directions: 1) assessing the role of heterogeneity by extending the use of gridded modeling of agricultural production coupled with land-water use; and 2) analysis of interactions between agriculture and new sources of energy, particularly bio-based energy. The tools developed will be built on a Science Gateway platform (FEWS-HUB) that will provide a quantitative, extensible basis for solving crucial future research and planning problems thus improving decision-making capabilities in FEWS topics within the world's two largest economies. Though the integrated assessment approach, this project will add to existing knowledge in several dimensions: gridded modeling of agricultural production; and coupling of the gridded agricultural model to a detailed general equilibrium model. Spatial models at a national level are too coarse to deal with the heterogeneity of agricultural production. Moreover, as water is ever more becoming a constraining factor for agriculture, it is vital to link agricultural production and hydrological models at basin scale. An expected outcome of this study is a framework to assess the importance of gridded-level heterogeneity as well as potential 'hotspots' linked to water availability. A second goal is coupling the Purdue-developed ENVISAGE Model to SIMPLE-G thus extending the latter model to include energy systems. ENVISAGE is an integrated assessment model with a large energy sub-module that provides an assessment of changes in bio-based energy including land-use implications. Coupling these two disparate models will allow new research questions to be addressed in a tractable and traceable framework. Sustainable development is a globally acknowledged grand challenge problem so improving observational and predictive capabilities in the FEWS framework will have positive impacts on food, water, energy, and national security.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.