Onwards workshop outcomes now posted

[Steve Easterbrook]

Folks,
I finally found time to post the slides and notes from the Onward!
workshop on Software Research and Climate Change in Orlando. Enjoy:
http://www.cs.toronto.edu/wsrcc/Outcomes.html

Steve

[Michael Tobis]

Thanks, Steve!

Though I'm no great fan of the Disney theme park experience, it was fun.

A lot of the attention was focused on software to support efficiency
or energy efficiency of software, which I proposed to call "green
software" and "soft greenware" (respectively?) although one person,
Mehment Aksit from the Netherlands, cogently argued that both were
tasks that could be allocated to compiler technology, an interesting
and promising approach.

Other participants just naturally fit into the simulation and
scientific software camp.

I pointed out that there was a lot more that software could do on the
outreach and public education side. So that's at least three or
perhaps four different broad thrusts. Have we missed any?

mt

[Steve Easterbrook]

I think I've whittled it down to three distinct research areas:

(1) Green IT
i.e. optimize power consumption of software and all things controlled
by software (a.k.a. make sure ICT is no longer part of the problem.
Examples:
Power aware computing (better management of power in all
devices from mobile to massive installations)
Green controllers (smart software to optimize and balance power
consumption in everything that consumes power)
Green algorithmics (inclusion of sustainability as a first
class requirement in software system design)

(2) Computer-Supported Collaborative Science (a.k.a. eScience)
i.e. software to support and accelerate inter-disciplinary science in
climatology and related disciplines.
Examples:
- Software engineering tools/techniques for climate modellers
- Data management for data-intensive science
- Open Notebook science (electronic notebooks)
- Social network tools for knowledge finding and expertise mapping
- Smart ontologies

(3) Software to improve global collective decision making.
i.e. everything from tools to improve public understanding of science
through to decision support at multiple levels (individual, community,
government, inter-governmental)
Examples:
- Simluations, games, educational software to support public
understanding of the science (usable climate science)
- massive open collaborative decision support
- carbon accounting for corporate decision making
- systems analysis of sustainability in human activity systems
(requires multi-level systems thinking)
- better understanding of the processes of social epistemology

My personal opinion is that (1) is getting to be a crowded field,
which is great, but will only yield up to about 15% of the 100%
reduction in carbon emissions we're aiming for. (2) is has been mapped
out as part of several initiatives in the UK and US on eScience, but
there's still a huge amount to be done. (3) is pretty much a green
field (no pun intended) at the moment. It's this third area that
fascinates me the most.

Steve

[Apt, Alan]

More outreach is certainly needed in the US, where people rank it last
on priorities. I think that is to some degree a function of the economy,
and the din from the right about the cost of action ending up on utility
bills. Climate Action must be better linked to positive economic impact
such as jobs. Building Smart Grid infrastructure, for example, will
generate lots of software and IT jobs.

Alan