Advanced Topics in
System Dynamics
Optimization
Ken Carpenter
Luis Luna
Introduction
System Dynamics has relied on the use of
intuition and experience by system
owners and analysts to help design
policies for improving system behavior
over time
Most descriptions of the System Dynamics
method emphasize the iterative process
required to validate Dynamic Hypothesis.
Introduction
Desired Model
Behavior
(Wolstenholme, 1990)
Manual changes to
simulation Model
Actual Model
Behavior
New parameter values
and structures
Simulation
Introduction
(Wolstenholme, 1990)
The concept of optimization is based on the automation of
the manual procedure.
Desired value of
objective function in
Model
Optimization
Actual value of
objective function in
model
New parameter
values and structure
Simulation
Most common optimization
problems
Optimization for Model Calibration
Curve fitting
Optimization for Policy Analysis
Save the World!!
Two Approaches
(Oliva, 2000)
Full-information maximum likelihood via
optimal filtering (FIMLOF)
Engineering statistics
Model Reference Optimization (MRO)
Non-linear optimization techniques
Model Reference Optimization
Main steps
Define an objective function (Pay-off)
Policy Analysis
Calibration
Define the Constraints (Parameters)
Apply one of the Optimization Methods (Use
Vensim or other software).