SAGE is actively assessing environmental impacts of energy use and exploring new opportunities to meet global energy demand. These activities build on ongoing research in air quality, climate change, land use, agriculture, and public health to help inform energy decision-making at the state, national, and international levels. Energy activities at SAGE tie closely into the Energy Analysis and Policy (EAP) Graduate Certificate Program offered through the Nelson Institute, the UW Energy Institute, and the Wisconsin Bioenergy Initiative (WBI).

P.I.s

• Dr. Greg Nemet, hired under the Energy Systems and Policy Cluster, evaluates policies to promote energy technology innovation and a range environmental/energy policy issues. He is active in the EAP Certificate program, and teaches energy policy classes in the LaFollette School of Public Policy and the Nelson Institute.

• Dr. Carol Barford assesses potential energy-crop production and broader issues in land use, farm economy, and energy.

• Dr. Tracey Holloway, hired under the Energy Systems and Policy Cluster, addresses environmental impacts of energy use, especially related to air quality and climate.

• Dr. Chris Kucharik's work focuses on sustainable biofuel production, and links between biofuels, climate, and food production. In the context of biofuels and bioenergy, his group is affiliated with the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC), supporting sustainability science research related to biofuel feedstocks derived from agricultural landscapes.

• Dr. Jonathan Patz examines the health impacts of energy strategies in an effort to design win-win solutions for health, energy, climate, and air quality.

Students, Post-Docs, and Research Staff

Ash Anandanarayanan, Ashwini Bharatkumar, Erica Bickford, Phillip Duran, Maggie Grabow, Steve Plachinski

Ongoing Projects

Assessing Carbon Neutrality and Ecology of Different Biofuel Cropping Systems in the Midwest U.S. – Kucharik is collaborating with colleagues in the Department of Agronomy (Prof. Randy Jackson, Prof. Josh Posner) to better understand how a shift to new cropping systems or rotations may impact carbon balance across the Midwest, as well as ecosystem structure and functioning. The work is part of the Sustainability Science Team (Area 4) of the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC), funded through the U.S. Department of Energy. Studies of net ecosystem exchange, plant phenology, greenhouse gas fluxes, and soil carbon pool changes at the field scale (near the UW Agricultural Research Station at Arlington) will be used to help parameterize and validate ecosystem modeling tools designed to scale-up across the Midwest. [US Department of Energy – Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC)]

Air Quality Benefits of Electricity Conservation and Renewables – Prof. Holloway's group works closely with Dr. Paul Meier and energy modelers from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to quantify the air quality benefits associated with cleaner, more efficient electricity production. Plachinski et al. [in review] characterizes air quality benefits associated with Wisconsin energy policies, and a related NREL-funded study quantifies how increased deployment of solar photovoltaics might improve air quality, especially during extreme heat events. A similar methodology will be used to characterize the impacts of heat waves on electricity emissions, air quality and health, funded by the National Institutes of Health and lead by Prof. Patz.

Choosing a Portfolio of Technology Policies in an Uncertain World (Nemet). This project aims to provide a framework for designing a portfolio of technology policies to address climate change. The researchers model the effects of combinations of policy instruments on a portfolio of technologies, when both the outcomes of the technology policies and the effects of climate change are uncertain. The project evaluates combinations of three policy instruments: government funded R&D; subsidies for demand; and carbon prices. (view NSF award page)

Estimating the Appropriability of Learning by Doing – This study uses data on wind power production to empirically examine the main economic justification for public subsidies of emerging energy technologies: that stimulating demand for them generates cost reductions by providing producers with opportunities for learning by doing (Nemet).

Evaluating the Role of Risk in Wisconsin Biomass Infrastructure Development – Bharatkumar and Barford are assessing the risk assumed by Wisconsin farmers in bioenergy crop production, and formulating potential risk mitigation strategies. The project uses existing data and farmer surveys to identify the primary risks faced in biomass production, and quantifies the impacts on farmers of these risks by evaluating potential financial losses due to each risk. The project also utilizes Monte Carlo simulation to assess the impact of the primary risks on optimal infrastructure scale and life-cycle analysis. Finally, the project aims to identify potential risk mitigation strategies. [Funding source:  UW-Holmstrom Environmental Scholarship]

Farm-Based Bioenergy Infrastucture for Wisconsin – Barford, Anandanarayanan and collaborators are investigating the effects of infrastructure scale on bioenergy logistics, especially feed-stock transportation. This project uses GIS and life-cycle analysis to find how to reduce costs of bioenergy by targeting investments in processing, storage, energy conversion and transportation equipment. Investments are targeted in space using field-scale maps of Wisconsin farms, coordinated with road and transportation spatial data. [Funding source:  Focus on Energy]

Impacts of Biofuel-Driven Changes in Land Use and Land Cover on Flows of Water, Carbon and Nutrients to Freshwaters – Kucharik is collaborating with co-investigators of the North Temperate Lakes Long Term Ecological Research project to study how the changing distribution of croplands affect nutrient flux to freshwaters and the cycling of C in the terrestrial-aquatic system, as well as how alternative biofuel feedstocks other than corn grain might impact water quality, carbon sequestration, and climate regulation. The Agro-IBIS model is being used across the Yahara Lakes watershed in southern Wisconsin to address these questions. Funding is provided by the National Science Foundation.

Landscape Structure and Natural Pest-Suppression Services in Bioenergy Landscapes: Implications for Regional Food and Fuel Production – Kucharik and colleagues Claudio Gratton, Tim Meehan, and Phil Townsend are studying how changes in the structure of the agricultural landscape will affect crop yield through indirect effects on natural enemies and crop pests. Focusing on soybean-based biofuel, its principle pest (soybean aphid) and its natural enemies (generalist predators such as ladybeetles) across a 19-county region of southern Wisconsin, the research team is using empirical and biophysical crop modeling to evaluate the role of landscape structure on biofuel yield through the indirect effects on natural enemies and pests.  Kucharik and colleagues will further develop remote-sensing approaches to expand predictions of biofuel yield and the effect of biocontrol services to the scale of the regional landscape.  By merging of these interdisciplinary approaches to address complex issues of species interactions at broad scales, they will generate maps that can help evaluate how ecosystem services such as biocontrol and crop yield trade off at the landscape scale thereby making the outcomes of this proposal relevant to land managers and policy makers. [Funding source:  USDA Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) – Bioenergy/Foundational Research, Sustainable Bioenergy Research, Program Area Code – A6121]

Quantifying Carbon Sequestration in Midwest US Bioenergy Cropping Systems: Scaling CO2 Fluxes from Leaf-Level to Landscapes – Kucharik and colleagues are studying how a land-use shift to planting more perennial grasses such as switchgrass or fast growing trees like hybrid poplar to support cellulosic ethanol production could sequester large quantities of carbon (C) back into vegetation and soils.  This would support ecosystem sustainability while providing a new income stream to farmers via participation in C-crediting programs. However, we currently lack the necessary field observations to verify that C-sequestration is occurring.  To address this shortcoming, Kucharik and colleagues are quantifying the C sequestration potential associated with three cropping system monocultures in the Arlington, WI region (continuous corn, switchgrass, and hybrid poplar) that are known for biomass production potential. They are coupling field measurements of leaf area index, soil temperature and moisture, soil CO2 respiration, and CO2 uptake by vegetation with a theoretical approach to scale leaf-level CO2 fluxes to the landscape scale to quantify the net ecosystem exchange of CO2. The study sites are associated with the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC) and the Wisconsin Integrated Cropping Systems Trial (WICST). The field observations will be used to validate an agroecosystem model (Agro-IBIS) to support future studies of ecosystem service trade-offs associated with bioenergy crops. [Funding source:  USDA Hatch]

Spatial-temporal Analysis of Current Power Generation and Potential Bioenergy Substitution in the GLBRC Region – Carol Barford, Paul Barford and Scott Alfeld (grad student in Computer Sciences) are analyzing the spatial and temporal characteristics of electric power generation in the Upper Midwest, using a unique data set of real-time power generation characteristics. This data set includes power output, CO2 emission rate, feedstock type, and market information. The analysis will be targeted to find economically and logistically feasible substitutions of biomass feedstock for fossil-based electric power. [Funding source:  BACTER-GLBRC]

Transportation and Air Quality – SAGE researchers quantify carbon emissions and air quality benefits of transportation fuel switching (e.g. diesel to natural gas, lead by Dr. Meier) and mode shifts (e.g. truck to rail, led by Prof. Holloway; car to bike, led by Prof. Patz). Projects related to truck and rail have been funded by the National Center for Freight Infrastructure, Research, and Education (CFIRE), for which Holloway serves as Associate Director. 

Where Do New Energy Technologies Come From? – Prof. Nemet is analyzing patent data to assess the extent to which important new energy technologies make use of knowledge developed in other technological domains. Examples include jet engines used for natural gas power plants; steel strands for radial tires used to slice solar cells; shipbuilding mills used to shape wind turbines blades. We assess prior art cited in energy patents to characterize predecessor knowledge. We use subsequent citations to each energy patent to proxy for each energy patent’s importance.

Willingness to Pay for a Climate Backstop – Prof. Nemet and students are modeling the impact of a negative emissions technology that could remove CO2 from the air. We are collaborating with colleagues from Stanford U. to assess the effect of such a technology on the global demand for vehicle fuels over the next several decades. Are findings are that producers of unconventional petroleum could benefit from such technology. Perhaps surprisingly, a very robust finding is that producers of conventional oil—which is less costly and less carbon intensive—benefit from a moderate CO2 price and thus would not fund the development of a climate backstop.

Updated: 9/9/11

SAGE is a Research Center of the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

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