The MIT School of Science is launching a center to advance knowledge and computational capabilities in sustainability science and help decision-makers in government, industry, and civil society achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. Working with MIT’s Climate Project, researchers at the MIT Center for Sustainability Science and Strategy will develop and apply expertise from across the Institute to improve understanding of sustainability challenges and provide actionable knowledge and insights to inform strategies to improve human well-being for current and future generations.
Noelle Selin, a professor in MIT’s Institute for Data, Systems, and Society and Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, will serve as the center’s first director. MIT senior researchers C. Adam Schlosser and Sergey Paltsev will serve as deputy directors, and Anne Slinn will serve as executive director.
By integrating and succeeding the Center for Global Change Science and the Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change while adding new capabilities, the center aims to produce cutting-edge research to help guide societal transitions toward a more sustainable future. Building on MIT’s long history of efforts to address global change and its integrated environmental and human dimensions, the center is well positioned to lead the burgeoning global effort to advance the field of sustainability science, which seeks to understand nature-society systems in all their complexity. This understanding is designed to be relevant and actionable for decision-makers in government, industry, and civil society as they work to develop viable pathways to improve the quality of life for multiple stakeholders.
“As major challenges such as climate, health, energy and food security increasingly affect people’s lives around the world, decision-makers need to better understand the Earth in all its complexity – people, technologies and institutions, and environmental processes,” Selin says. “A better understanding of these systems and how they interact can lead to more effective strategies that avoid unintended consequences and ensure a better quality of life for all.”
Advancing knowledge, computing capabilities and decision support
In order to produce more precise and comprehensive knowledge on sustainability challenges and to guide decision-makers in formulating more effective strategies, the centre has set itself the following objectives:
- Improve fundamental understanding of the complex and interconnected physical and socio-economic systems that affect human well-being. New policies and technologies developed in the context of climate change and other global changes are interacting with environmental processes and institutions in ways that alter Earth’s life-support systems. The fundamental mechanisms that determine the behavior of many of these systems, including those related to the interactions between climate, water, food, and socio-economic systems, remain largely unknown and poorly quantified. Better understanding can help society mitigate the risks of abrupt changes and “tipping points” in these systems.
- Develop, implement and distribute new IT tools towards a better understanding of Earth systemsincluding environmental and human dimensions. The center’s work will integrate modeling and data analysis across disciplines in an era of increasing volumes of observational data. MIT’s multi-system models and data products will provide robust information to inform decision-making and shape the next generation of sustainability science and strategy.
- Producing actionable science that supports equity and justice within and across generationsThe center’s research will be designed to inform actions associated with measurable outcomes aligned with supporting human well-being across generations. This requires engaging a broad range of stakeholders, including not only nations and businesses, but also non-governmental organizations and communities that are taking action to promote sustainable development – with particular attention to those who have historically borne the brunt of environmental injustice.
“The center’s work will advance fundamental understanding of sustainability science, leverage cutting-edge computing and data technologies, and promote engagement and impact,” Selin said. “Our researchers will support leading scientists and policymakers around the world who share MIT’s commitment to mobilizing knowledge to inform action for a more sustainable world.”
Building a Better World at MIT
Building on MIT’s existing capabilities in sustainability, science and strategy, the center aims to:
- focus research, education and outreach under a theme that reflects a comprehensive state of the field and international research directions, fostering a vibrant community of students, researchers and faculty;
- increase the visibility of sustainability science at MIT, emphasizing the connections between science and action, in the context of the Institute’s existing goals and other efforts on climate and sustainability, and in a manner that reflects the vital contributions of a range of natural and social science disciplines to understanding human-environment systems; and
- reaffirm MIT’s longstanding expertise in integrated systems modeling while leveraging the Institute’s concurrent cutting-edge strengths in data and computing, establishing leadership that leverages recent innovations, including those in machine learning and artificial intelligence, to address the scientific challenges of global change and sustainability.
“The Center for Sustainability Science and Strategy will provide the synergy needed for MIT researchers to develop, deploy, and scale serious solutions to climate change and other critical sustainability challenges,” said Nergis Mavalvala, the Curtis and Kathleen Marble Professor of Astrophysics and dean of the MIT School of Science. “With Professor Selin at its helm, the center will also ensure that these solutions are created in consultation with the people who will be directly affected today and in the future.”
The center builds on more than three decades of accomplishments by the Center for Global Change Science and the Joint Program on Global Change Science and Policy, both directed or co-directed by Professor of Atmospheric Sciences Ronald Prinn.
