Improved Decision Support in the Energy Sector Using NASA Spaceborne Observations and Models

The NASA Applied Sciences Program Energy Management Program Element establishes partnerships with federal and private organizations to improve their decisions and assessments that impact the energy sector. These improvements are enabled by leveraging the knowledge generated from research resulting from spacecraft observations and model predictions conducted by NASA and providing these as inputs to the decision support and scenario assessment tools used by partner organizations. The Energy Management Program element focuses its efforts to provide for improved decisions and assessments for the following primary areas:, (1) Renewable energy & Energy efficiency, (2) Impacts of climate change on the energy sector, (3) Long-term energy modeling and forecasting, and (4) Supply and load forecasting/Distributed energy. The goals of the Program Element seek to maintain alignment and contribute to national and international priorities, specifically the Climate Change Science and Technology Programs, and the Group on Earth Observations (GEO). The approach of the Energy Management Program Element is to develop information pathways from NASA spacecraft observations and Earth system modeling to decision support tools (DST) supporting energy demand and availability in industry, government, and private entities. These entities require historical, near-real time, and forecasted environmental observations as inputs to the DST for management decisions and scenario assessments for policy. NASA works with its partners to identify the physical quantities provided by NASA observations and model predictions resulting from Earth science research, which are specifically selected, derived, and formatted to meet the needs of a specific DST. Specific case studies describing partnerships with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and with the International Energy Agency resulting in the use of NASA measurements in renewable energy DSTs are presented. We also describe a partnership whereby NASA surface solar energy measurements are employed in an integrated assessment model used for scenario assessments for the Climate Change Technology Program. Future plans for expanding the use of NASA measurements and models into other energy sectors, in assessing the potential utility of next-general spaceborne sensors for energy decision support, and in responding to the GEO energy societal benefit area work plan are described.