ANN ARBOR—President-elect Barack Obama has proposed putting a million American-made plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) getting 150 mpg on the road by 2015, but it’s hard to know if that goal is attainable or pie in the sky.

University of Michigan’s energy institute announces an innovative strategy to tell the difference between inspired and misguided, and what it takes to make a good idea become great policy.

“Too many proposed solutions to the energy crisis have crumbled because of unintended consequences, and we do not have the time to break our addiction to fossil fuels with another well-intentioned idea that can’t make it in the complicated real world,” said Gary Was, director of the Michigan Memorial Phoenix Energy Institute at U-M. “We need to find a way to transform innovations in energy into reality with an unprecedented level of speed and efficiency.”

The institute is providing $365,000 in seed money launching an effort to build a robust, ultimately Web-based, interactive tool that enables people to answer real-world questions about how (and if) technologies can succeed and where the bear traps are.

Steven Skerlos, a U-M associate professor of mechanical engineering, is leading a team that brings experts in engineering, sociology, mathematical modeling and psychology for an unprecedented melding of technology and social science knowledge.

“From lead in gasoline (that seemed like a great way to improve fuel efficiency, but ended up poisoning children for an entire generation) to corn ethanol, that was touted as a great renewable energy source, but then was reviled for its unintended impact on global food prices, we need to build a tool that will answer big questions for us quickly and accurately,” Was said. “We are finding our way to that tool.”

These models, intended to be modular, accessible and changeable over the Web, will provide unprecedented capability and accessibility for answering how the energy world works and what are the likely consequences of actions, policies and world events.

“We are at an environmental precipice and have to get our policy right the first time,” said Skerlos, director of the Environmental and Sustainable Technologies Laboratory. “We want to develop a user-friendly, yet academically rigorous approach to make sure policymakers and the general public have information that will lead to a more informed debate regarding how and when to reduce the climate change impacts of the automotive sector.”

Skerlos is working with Panos Papalambros, mechanical engineering; Rich Gonzalez, psychology; James Jackson, Institute for Social Research; Meredith Fowlie, economics and public policy; Duncan Callaway and Greg Keoleian, School of Natural Resources and Environment; and Walter McManus and John Sullivan, U-M Transportation Research Institute.

PHEVs have gained a lot of attention for their potential to tap into the electric grid to reduce greenhouse emissions and increase energy security. Skerlos notes that PHEVs come on the heels of other energy-saving darlings such as hydrogen fuel cells and biofuels.

He sees that in the past, technologies have been lauded and discounted by discussions heavy on politics and multiple agendas.

“There is no systemic, objective framework to study these problems that simultaneously accounts for realistic design decisions driven by market behavior subject to regulation,” he said. “There are loads of agendas yet not enough science in the debate.”

The immediate goal is to create an interactive Web site-based model where users can explore scenarios for future automotive and electricity grid performance and costs. The model will also examine market conditions subject to regulation, and visualize the time-scales over which PHEVs will reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Perhaps more importantly, the website will present measures that will aid in assessing the quality of simulation outcomes for society and the realism of the input scenarios.

The questions are from many fronts. Some are technical, such as miles per gallon and battery power. Some are based on performance, some on cost and incentives, and others on regulatory concerns, such as Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) regulations or emissions trading. Skerlos notes that the novelty here lies in informing economic models with technological and regulatory design options, while presenting baffling complexity in an accessible and transparent form.

“We are building a simulator that estimates future greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector and reflects the socio-economic, regulatory and technological realities that all come to bear on the problem,” Skerlos said. “Then we will be able to ask ‘which future would you like us to test for PHEVs?'”

From there, Skerlos sees being able to extend their current capabilities to test other technologies, such as biofuels and hydrogen vehicles.

Was emphasizes that the Energy Science, Technology and Policy Award is intended to jumpstart these sweeping innovations, and that once the Skerlos team demonstrates the efficacy of the strategy on the PHEV test case, significant outside funding will be required to realize its full promise.

“Our intent is to show the world what is possible, and to show some of the enormous and exciting potential a modeling tool could bring to critical decision making,” Was said. “We see a future where people can hear a campaign pledge, a proposed policy or a promising new technology and have a way to start applying facts from the real world to test them and make good decisions. This is just the tip of the iceberg, but it’s an important first step on the path to solving the energy crisis.”

U-M Sustainability fosters a more sustainable world through collaborations across campus and beyond aimed at educating students, generating new knowledge, and minimizing our environmental footprint. Learn more at sustainability.umich.edu.

Related Links:

• Skerlos

• Michigan Memorial Phoenix Energy Institute