Sustainable Systems & Energy
MERIT's Sustainable Systems & Energy theme responds to the rising importance we attach to the environment and the need to create more sustainable solutions in support of the way we live today.
This theme adopts a multidisciplinary approach to the development of sustainable solutions. It draws on research from across the Melbourne School of Engineering and incorporates elements such as sensor network research and spatial information technologies. For example, to address problems of salinity and waterlogging resulting from current irrigation practices in Australia, our researchers are developing and testing methods for extending instantaneous estimates of actual evapotranspiration using remotely sensed data.
Our research approach ensures that sustainable solutions can be managed and evaluated for their impact on the economy, society and the environment. This builds on our strengths in the areas of Environmental Systems and the Spatially Enabled Infrastructure and expands on our expertise in Urban Systems. This is further augmented by the application of Systems Analysis and Engineering Management techniques across these fields.
Much of the work in our research areas is interdisciplinary, with strong collaborations with research centres, government and commercial organisations:
- Environmental Systems - teams investigate water and land, energy and emissions, materials and minerals, and wastes and recycling. This includes projects in water recovery, desalination and recycling, tailings management for sustainable mining, new initiatives in carbon dioxide (CO2) mitigation strategies and sustainable processing in the dairy industry. A notable project is the potential development of a bio-oils industry in Australia, which is not only sustainable and greenhouse neutral but also addresses Australia's salinity problem. This research looks at the potential of bio-oil from woody biomass as a sustainable future energy source. Moreover, the project has the added benefit of developing new engineering measurement technologies based on synchrotron x-rays for use in complex combusting systems.
- Urban Systems - researchers focus on the built environment with key projects including efficient buildings, smart cities and transport networks. Teams also look at physical infrastructure integrity and protection.
- Systems Analysis and Engineering Management - our approach underpins modelling, analysis and the ongoing management of systems. The focus is on linking engineering and business systems including aspects of risk management, policy/legal systems, infrastructure investment, decision-making and project planning.
- Spatially Enabled Infrastructure - supports research across a range of fields, with measurement, sensors, positioning, geographic information systems (GIS), spatial analysis, visualisation, spatial cognition, spatial data infrastructure (SDI) and land administration tools. This is illustrated by current research looking at forest management options. Choices made in the field affect people's livelihood and other elements of sustainability. This study is using GIS and visualisation technologies, together with social science research, to determine the acceptability of forest management systems when the social, economic and ecological costs and benefits are presented on a landscape level. The study will allow us to better understand the potential of interactive visualisation technology for understanding societal judgements of land management options.