Maximum (em)power: a foundational principle linking man and nature

Hypothesized as a universal principle of system self-organization, selection for maximum power provided the basis for H.T. Odum’s systems-based understanding of energy transformation dynamics, which ultimately resulted in his emergy-based methods of ecosystem and environmental policy analysis. Odum’s formulation of the principle emphasized the selective advantage potentially available to systems that acquire useful energy at the maximum rate possible within their environments, with energy deemed useful if it reinforces production through increased available energy acquisition. Based on this principle, Odum postulated a correspondence of the maintenance requirements of energy fluxes with their contributions to system power acquisition. A quantitative correlate with usefulness is thus provided by emergy, i.e., by the available energy of one kind used directly or indirectly to maintain storages and flows. A more explicit and precise understanding of the energetics of self-organization was thus suggested, and Odum accordingly reformulated the principle as selection for maximum rate of emergy acquisition (i.e., empower), which provides the standard for assessment of system adaptedness in current methods of emergy analysis. The many corollary hypotheses derived from the principle include the selective prevalence of intermediate efficiencies and process rates and of pulsing dynamics, emergy hierarchies, and territoriality under appropriate energy-influx regimes. Assessments of socioeconomic and environmental alternatives might be further improved by integrating this principle with modern theories of multilevel selection.