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Energy & Complexity Conference 2025

Date

On Wednesday 22nd January 2025, over 100 researchers, policymakers, and practitioners convened in Leeds for the Energy & Complexity 2025 conference—a pivotal event exploring the intersection of energy systems and complexity science. Held at Horizon Leeds and supported by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, the one-day conference built on the legacy of a 2012 Oxford gathering hosted by the UK Energy Research Centre.

The event offered a dynamic platform for advancing interdisciplinary approaches to energy challenges, with a strong focus on systems thinking and just transitions to Net Zero.

Conference Highlights:

  • Attendees heard keynote presentations from Dr. Émile Chappin (TU Delft), Beth Green (Department for Energy Security & Net Zero), and Prof Liz Varga (UCL), who shared insights on simulation, government systems thinking, and decarbonisation.
  • A panel Q&A, live-streamed for virtual participants, featured experts including Abbie Badcock-Broe (National Grid), Peter Barbrook-Johnson (Oxford), and Dr Kavin Narasimhan (Warwick), discussing priorities for complexity science in energy policy over the next five years.
  • Early-career researchers presented lightning talks, while knowledge cafés facilitated collaborative agenda-setting for future research.

The conference successfully fostered dialogue across disciplines—engineering, social science, and modelling—highlighting the need for complexity-informed approaches to energy futures. Virtual attendees also engaged through live-streamed sessions and interactive Q&A.