On May 3, 2013 GMF convened a group of high-level business leaders, policymakers, and other thought leaders from the United States and Europe in a full-day discussion on the global energy system. The workshop was hosted at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and is part if the Energy Transition Forum’s work stream on systems (re)thinking.

After welcoming remarks by GMF’s senior director for public policy programs, Dymphna van der Lans, and Gerard Moutet, vice president climate – energy at Total SA, participants were presented with results of a GMF value-mapping exercise analyzing the group’s assumptions of how the energy system works. Following discussion on the value-mapping exercise, Drew Jones, co-director of Climate Interactive, gave a presentation on their dynamic modeling system En-ROADS, which allows the user to gain a better understanding for how changes in global GDP, energy efficiency, R&D results, carbon price, fuel mix, and other factors affect carbon emissions and temperature change. During the afternoon session of the workshop, participants were able to use the model to test their assumptions of how to fix the energy system and see in real-time the results of their interventions. The exercise highlighted the complexity of the system and the all too frequent results of unintended consequences.

Participants in the workshop ended the day with several key insights including the notion that there is no “silver bullet” solution in redesigning the energy system. In working with the model, participants came to understand that the interconnected nature of the system requires action on multiple fronts to decrease its carbon intensity over time.

These insights and other outcomes from this discussion will be feed into the annual Energy Transition Forum meeting in June 2013.