The missing component of energy models: People

A team of Carnegie Mellon University researchers led by Turner Cotterman, an engineering and public policy (EPP) Ph.D. student, has shown that sustainably decarbonizing our energy system by 2050 will require us to change the way we model energy transitions and account for the role of public opinion. Advised by Mitchell Small, professor of engineering and public policy and civil and environmental engineering, Cotterman and co-authors use nuclear energy as a case study of how conventional energy models—which minimize system costs—fail at accounting for social acceptance, a factor that can inhibit the deployment of certain technologies, like nuclear energy.