Date: 31st May
Hour: 2.30 p.m.
Venue: Amphitheatre FA2, Alameda Campus

Speaker: Tânia Sousa (IST/DEM/Environment and Energy)
Title: “Insights into the Thermodynamics of Societies through Societal Exergy Analysis”

«Abstract:
Metabolism, initially developed within the field of Biology, is a concept that applies to autopoietic entities – those that interact with their environment by exchanging mass and energy flows to sustain and reproduce themselves. Thus, a thorough understanding of metabolism must be grounded in the fundamental Laws of Thermodynamics. The concept of metabolism has extended beyond biological systems and is now utilized in the quantitative analysis of social systems such as cities, regions, and countries using methodologies such as the Societal Exergy Accounting (SEA), Economy-wide Material Flow Accounting and the Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism. In this seminar, I will present the Societal Exergy Accounting (SEA) methodology, addressing the methodological challenges we encounter in its application and showcasing our key findings regarding metabolic indicators for Portugal and the World.

Speaker bio:
Tânia Sousa, M.Sc. in Environmental Engineering (IST) and Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering (IST) and Life and Earth Sciences (Free University of Amsterdam), is an Auxiliary Professor in the Mechanical Engineering Department at IST. Her main research areas are the societal exergy accounting at the national and sectorial levels for the metabolism of societies and DEB theory for the metabolism of organisms.»

The “Seminars@DEM” are organised by the Department of Mechanical Engineering (DEM).