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Improving Decisions in a Complex and Changing World
Climate change presents public and private sector decisionmakers with a fundamental quandary: how to address a potentially serious, long-term, and deeply uncertain threat. By waiting until new science and unfolding events eliminate much of the uncertainty, it may be too late for decisionmakers to act effectively. If they act without understanding the extent and contours of the problem, they risk making serious miscalculations.
Research Focus
This project has three goals:
- conduct basic research needed to improve computer-based tools that enable decisionmakers to make better choices when confronted with deep uncertainty about the future;
- examine the best means to represent uncertain scientific information for decisionmakers so they can act on it more effectively, whether as individuals or groups; and
- strengthen the scientific foundations of robust decisionmaking (RDM), a promising new approach to computer-assisted support for decisionmakers facing deep uncertainty. When the future is hard to predict with confidence, RDM helps decisionmakers identify strategies that perform well over a range of plausible futures.
Policy Areas
This project will draw on interactions with decisionmakers in two important policy areas:
In addition to aiding decisionmakers in these two domains, the project will improve methods to support decisionmaking under conditions of deep uncertainty for a wide range of public and private sector decision challenges.
Recent News
Researchers Robert Lempert and David Groves brief members of Congress — January 2008
On January 31, 2008, Robert Lempert and David Groves briefed members of Congress and their staff about new methods for water managers to prepare for climate change. The briefing summarized findings from two recently released reports.
Read the research brief Identifying and Reducing Climate-Change Vulnerabilities in Water Management Plans
Robert Lempert in Capitol Hill forum — April 2007
On March 30, 2007 Robert Lempert participated in a Capitol Hill Forum on climate change as part of the the NYU/RAND "Legislating for the Future" effort. His presentation "Creating Constituencies for Long-Term, Radical Change" draws in part from research conducted under this DMUU project.
Read Creating Constituencies for Long-Term, Radical Change
RAND Researcher Robert Lempert on NPR — Feb. 1, 2007
Robert Lempert was interviewed on National Public Radio providing his thoughts on the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report.Listen to the interview Research by Robert Lempert 
Hot Topic: Climate Change
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