This proposal supports a workshop to consider the sustainability of biofuel production from both agricultural ecosystems and managed natural ecosystems in the United States. The most general goal of the workshop is to use the challenges presented by biofuel production to stimulate advances in the science of sustainability, focusing on both theoretical frameworks and analytical tools. The workshop will stress the interdisciplinary nature of the issue, bringing together biologists, economists, social scientists, and engineers. One of the greatest challenges in assessing the sustainability of biofuel production in the U.S. lies in developing analytical tools and models that allow reassessment of sustainability in the face of potentially rapid change in both technology and the environment. Advancing research in biofuel production and in sustainability science more generally will require significant new developments in the ability to develop predictive models that integrate across diverse disciplines.
The workshop has the potential to stimulate new interdisciplinary collaboration to improve the ability of the scientific community to assess the sustainability of a wide range of human activities. The focus of the workshop on the subject of the sustainability of biofuel production has important public policy implications, given the extraordinary pace of developments in this area. The workshop will focus on approaches to improving public understanding of the dimensions of sustainability, and the specific issues associated with sustainability of biofuel production. One of the workshop's specific goals is to provide recommendations to NSF on ways to foster advances in the foundations for analysis of sustainability.
