What the Collaboratorium is
The Climate Collaboratorium is an on-line forum that allows large numbers of people to work together in developing plans to address climate change.
The Collaboratorium combines:
- Open simulation modeling
- Large scale argumentation
- Group decision making
Open simulation modeling
The Collaboratorium uses three primary kinds of models.
- Climate models
These are models of the world's physical systems and are used to project the impact of future greenhouse gas emissions on the world's climate. The most sophisticated of these are known as general circulation models (GCMs), which are used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The Preview version of the Collaboratorium uses a single climate model, C-LEARN, which is a Web-based version of C-ROADS, a simulation of Sustainability Institute and Ventana Systems that is part of the Climate Interactive effort.
- Integrated assessment models
These models assess the impact of various actions, in particular, carbon pricing mechanisms, designed to address climate change. IAMs typically include policy modules, which incorporates economic and technological variables, as well as a physical science model that is a less complex than a GCM. The Integrated Assessment Society (TIAS) provides a good overview of this field. The Preview version of the Collaboratorium does not include any IAMS, though we plan to incorporate them in future releases.
- Bottoms up technology models
These models assess the impact on emissions of adoption of new technologies. The Preview version of the Collaboratorium does not include any technology models, though we plan to incorporate them in future releases.
In future versions of the Collaboratorium, we plan to link to move toward radically open modeling, where users can modify the models used in the system.
Large scale argumentation
In the Collaboratorium, large distributed groups can create argument maps, which consist of chains of pros and cons attached to a particular discussion topic, for example, a proposal for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
An argument map represents a systematic compilation of many people's insights on the topic. The map can serve as the basis for a well-founded collective decision making process, through voting or negotiation.
By using argument maps and voting or negotiation, groups can decide more intelligently between the many options available to them.
For more on the advantages of deliberation maps, you can watch this YouTube video.