[FRIAM] A billion agents

[Douglas Roberts]

Interesting, Ray.  A number of years ago a couple of LANL program managers
and I went back to Washington to try to interest DOE in an ABM that was
intended to do exactly what you describe blow.  In addition, the simulation
would have allowed market gaming scenarios to be run for analyzing how the
power arbitragers (remember CalPine?) could game the market (remember all
those windfall profits the power companies were making in California a few
years back?).

We spent a few days, but basically could not find anybody at DOE willing to
give us the time of day, so the project never flew.  We did mention a couple
of times during our visit that DOE does have the word "Energy" in it.  Had
we gotten any support, the system would have been named ElectriSims, and
would have been another if the family of "SIM's" developed over the years by
our group (TRAMSIMS, EpiSims, MobiCOM).

--Doug (still completely unimpressed by the US Department of Energy --
rhymes with "Doh!")



>    What I'm hearing is that you-all (or at least Doug) use statistically
> valid distributions to program the behaviour of your agents.  This seems
> reasonable for things that can be measured with certainty - patient
> response to disease, for example.  However, it seems to me that if you
> conduct a survey of a population sample concerning, say, political
> opinion or purchasing habits, you run the risk of bias in the survey
> being translated into bias in the ABM.
>
>    Let me suggest an example close to my own heart.  I am interested in
> how people react to retail market price changes in electricity in future
> demand-response systems.  There are some data from existing
> demand-response systems but these function differently than newer
> systems.  What's more, the populations are geographically different from
> the target populations and they are much smaller.  We could survey
> customers to see if they would allow their heating and air-conditioning
> systems to respond to market prices.  The trouble with past surveys of
> this type is that utility customers tend to be more willing to sacrifice
> comfort in the abstract than in reality.  If one uses the PDF from the
> survey, then the results are far different than the PDF from the
> reality.  And, the reality only works for certain locales and climes.
>
> --
> Ray Parks                   rcparks at sandia.gov
> IDART Project Lead          Voice:505-844-4024
> IORTA Department            Mobile:505-238-9359
> http://www.sandia.gov/scada Fax:505-844-9641
> http://www.sandia.gov/idart Pager:800-690-5288
>
>
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-- 
Doug Roberts, RTI International
droberts at rti.org
doug at parrot-farm.net
505-455-7333 - Office
505-670-8195 - Cell
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