Energy in the solar system is constantly being converted from one form to another. Often
these processes take the form of dramatic events such as solar eruptions or geomagnetic
storms with important societal impacts. Understanding energy conversion and magnetic
storms is one of the grand challenges facing science and poses a great cultural and
scientific puzzle. We plan to use a new modelling approach based on combining state of the
art supercomputers with state of the art numerical methods that allow us to capture the
key aspect in energy conversion: the interplay of small and large scales. At the core of
energy conversion is the ability of macroscopic systems to store and process vast amounts
of energy while at the same time requiring microscopic processes at the moment the energy
is released. To describe and predict how energy can be stored for long periods and why it
is then suddenly released, a complete description down to the level of tracking the
trajectory of single particles is needed.