Digital Commons Network^™

Collaborative Gaming To Explore The Water-Land-Carbon-Food-Energy Nexus Challenges In The Eu, Joep Schyns

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Reconciling the EU policy targets on food and energy security, sustainable and efficient resource use, and climate adaptation is a major challenge due to the many feedbacks in the water-land-carbon-food-energy nexus. In the context of the H2020 MAGIC-NEXUS project, we have developed a collaborative educational nexus game for people with an interest or stake in policy development in the nexus domain, without in-depth prior knowledge to the interactions in the nexus (e.g., EU and national policy makers, MSc and BSc level students). The purpose of the game is to experience the challenges and solutions for member states – as part …

Collaborative Gaming To Explore The Water-Land-Carbon-Food-Energy Nexus Challenges In The Eu, Joep Schyns

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Reconciling the EU policy targets on food and energy security, sustainable and efficient resource use, and climate adaptation is a major challenge due to the many feedbacks in the water-land-carbon-food-energy nexus. In the context of the H2020 MAGIC-NEXUS project, we have developed a collaborative educational nexus game for people with an interest or stake in policy development in the nexus domain, without in-depth prior knowledge to the interactions in the nexus (e.g., EU and national policy makers, MSc and BSc level students). The purpose of the game is to experience the challenges and solutions for member states – as part …

Eliciting, Formalising, And Debiasing Mental Models Through An Online Tool For Serious Discussions, Madiha Anjum

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

A mental model is simplified representation of an individual’s thought process about how something works. Mental models can play an important role in understanding thinking patterns of an individual or a group. Practitioners from fields as diverse as behavioural science, psychology, economics, education and sustainability could gain much insight from tools that enable them to understand mental models expressed by a group within a given problem. There are many online and offline forums/tools available for involving users in discussions but none of them are using/considering mental models and most of them do not extract insights from ongoing discussions, do not …

Eliciting, Formalising, And Debiasing Mental Models Through An Online Tool For Serious Discussions, Madiha Anjum

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

A mental model is simplified representation of an individual’s thought process about how something works. Mental models can play an important role in understanding thinking patterns of an individual or a group. Practitioners from fields as diverse as behavioural science, psychology, economics, education and sustainability could gain much insight from tools that enable them to understand mental models expressed by a group within a given problem. There are many online and offline forums/tools available for involving users in discussions but none of them are using/considering mental models and most of them do not extract insights from ongoing discussions, do not …

Decision Support Tools For Participatory Sustainable Groundwater Management In California, Nigel Quinn

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

One hundred years of government agency inaction on groundwater sustainability management in California was reversed in 2014 with passage of the Groundwater Sustainability Act, (SGMA) https://water.ca.gov/Programs/Groundwater-Management/SGMA-Groundwater-Management. Unregulated groundwater pumping has, since the last major California drought of 2012-2013, led to a significant increase in the number of deep aquifer wells installed and a return of land subsidence in some of the most intensively farmed agricultural area – some areas dropping more than 0.5 metres annually in recent years. The State of California has adopted an innovative stakeholder-centric approach to SGMA planning and implementation through a requirement that stakeholders form locally …

Decision Support Tools For Participatory Sustainable Groundwater Management In California, Nigel Quinn

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

One hundred years of government agency inaction on groundwater sustainability management in California was reversed in 2014 with passage of the Groundwater Sustainability Act, (SGMA) https://water.ca.gov/Programs/Groundwater-Management/SGMA-Groundwater-Management. Unregulated groundwater pumping has, since the last major California drought of 2012-2013, led to a significant increase in the number of deep aquifer wells installed and a return of land subsidence in some of the most intensively farmed agricultural area – some areas dropping more than 0.5 metres annually in recent years. The State of California has adopted an innovative stakeholder-centric approach to SGMA planning and implementation through a requirement that stakeholders form locally …

Operationalizing Social Ecological Systems Resilience Analysis Using A Dynamic Index, Bruno Meirelles

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Governance of social ecological systems (SES) is a difficult task. Embrace its complexity, the coupled nature of social and ecological dimensions, feedbacks and non-linearity of its attributes and the necessity of dealing with society participation in the decision process make the challenge bigger. Resilience is a growing research field that can collaborate with this discussion. Resilience is a SES feature that enhance its capacity of maintain identity under different systems changes. This work uses system dynamics theory as foundation to build a Dynamic Resilience Index. This index uses Cobb-Douglas equation to encompass several resilience attributes as biodiversity, social networks, institutions, …

An Integrated Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis Framework For Assessing The Sustainability Of Alternative Jet Fuels, Ben W. Kolosz Phd, John M. Andresen Phd, Bing Xu Phd, P Greening Phd, J Ouenniche Phd, Mercedes M. Maroto-Valer Phd

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

One of the most viable options to decarbonise the aviation industry is to operate existing engines and aircrafts through low-carbon alternative jet fuels (AJFs). The key advantages of these fuels are that they work with existing engine technology, allowing a seamless transition between conventional petroleum jet fuels and more sustainable feedstocks. Lifecycle Assessment models have introduced datasets which attempt to estimate the emissions of AJFs’ process pathways from various feedstocks. To assist with decision making and policy formation in AJFs, a more relativistic performance of different technology solutions must be assessed to provide an impartial picture of technologies. Here, we …

A Web-Based Framework To Support Regional Groundwater Sustainability, Norm Jones, Alan Mayo, James Greer, Alan Lemon, James Nelson

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Water managers face the daunting task of managing freshwater resources in the face of industrialization and population growth. As surface water resources become fully allocated, increased groundwater use can fill the void, particularly during periods of drought. Improper groundwater management can result in reduced water quality, land subsidence, increased pumping costs, and in some cases, the complete exhaustion of an aquifer and the loss of groundwater as a buffer during times of drought. Assessing the long-term impact of various groundwater management decisions can be difficult and costly, and therefore many decisions are made without sufficient analysis.

Sustainable groundwater management that …

Engineers Vs The Environment: The Case For Ecosystem Services In University Education, Kate O'Brien, William Mogg

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The concept of ecosystems services provides a powerful framework for education and environmental decision-making. Engineers have an important role to play in the sustainable management of ecosystem services, since engineers design, operate and maintain the processes, infrastructure and equipment which have the potential to damage or destroy environmental systems. However, while sustainability is a concept embraced by professional engineering organisations and taught (in some form) in all reputable engineering degrees, the concept of ecosystem services is not widely known or accepted within the profession, and therefore not considered to be a core part of engineering education. In this study, we …

Economic Viability And Environmental Impact Of Processing Arid Crops In The American Southwest, Hailey Summers, Evan Sproul, Jason Quinn

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Drought represents a significant risk for agricultural producers in the American Southwest. One method for limiting this risk is planting high value crops that are drought resilient. Two such crops, Guayule and Guar, are native to arid climates and produce a broad range of valuable products including natural rubber, guar gum, and biofuels. This work outlines two process models used to evaluate the efficiency of converting raw Guayule and Guar biomass into final products. The process models are leveraged to develop life cycle (LCA) and techno-economic analyses (TEA) that will be used to evaluate the social, environmental and economic feasibility …

Systems Approach To Link Big Socio-Ecological Geo-Data To Food Systems Sustainability, Quang Bao Le, Chandrashekhar Biradar, Enrico Bonaiuti, Richard Thomas

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Rapid development of multi-dimensionally, multi-scale, timely updated socio-ecological geo-data presents an opportunity as potential information resource for supporting effective decision- making of stakeholders involved with food systems, from daily routines of individuals to strategic decisions of manager and policy-makers. However, the use of this type of big data toward supporting the sustainability of food systems at different scales still fall short of (i) what information commonly needed by food system actors to response and adapt to socio-ecological change and enhance the system performance, (ii) interoperability between different types of data across scales, and (iii) sufficient guidance to utilize big data …

Methodological Abilities Of Integrated Models To Support Agricultural Landscape Resilience: Current Status And Research Perspectives, Quang Bao Le

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

It is important to increase the resilience of rural landscapes in the face of global changes. It is widely recognized that integrated modeling is often a methodological choice to study landscape resilience because the task is often beyond the ability of direct, empirical studies. However, so far there has not yet been a systemized, critical review on methodological abilities current modeling approaches can have for supporting management for agricultural landscape resilience. This review study (i) highlighted the methodological abilities of integrated system modeling ideally needed for agricultural landscape management for resilience, (ii) reviewed strengths and weakness of common integrated modeling …

The Role Of Social Institutions In The Resolution Of International Conflicts Over Shared Fishing Resources, Cezara Păstrăv, Frank Dignum

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

International conflicts over shared fishing resources may rise in numbers in the context of climate change, which has lead, and will continue to lead, to changes in behavior patterns and geographic distribution of fish and other marine resources of interest to the fishing industry. Under these circumstances, being able to quickly adapt to unexpected changes becomes a very desirable trait for the fishing industry. Unfortunately, the current conflict resolution processes are often difficult, time consuming and sometimes not maintained.

We are interested in whether more sustainable mechanisms, that act from the bottom up and are easier to enforce by the …

Exploration Of The Long Term Sustainability Of The French Risk Management, Frédéric Grelot, Bruno Bonté, Zhongyang Fang

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Public flood risk management (FRM) in France, as in other countries like USA, Great Britain, relies on a combination of tools dealing with the negative consequences of flood. Spatial scale of those tools differs: insurance is defined and managed at national scale, land use regulation is defined at national scale but implemented at local scale, protection against flood may be implemented at local or even individual scales. The objective of this communication is to build a model for the analysis of the sustainability of the French FRM. For this, we used a simple but contextualized agent-based model (Cat-Nat ABM).

In …

Experiences With A Serious Online Game For Exploring Complex Relationships Of Sustainable Land Management And Human Well-Being: Landyous, Ralf Seppelt, Romina Martin, Alexander Finger, Christin Henzen, Martin Linder, Katrin Pietzsch, Andreas Werntze, Ute Zander, Jule Schulze

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Land is a limited resource. Its use for one purpose excludes other uses. Addressing the issue of human appropriation of natural resources thus requires understanding of a variety of complex feedbacks between decisions on land use and ecosystem services. The complexity is caused by a large number of mostly nonlinear feedbacks between management strategies, productivity, environmental quality, human well-being, consumption and many other aspects of land use. Here, we present LandYOUs: an educational online game, which aims at explaining and illustrating various options and feedbacks of sustainable land management (SLM) to the interested public, students and stakeholders. The game gives …

The Use Of Models To Design Pest Suppressive Landscapes For Sustainable Agricultural Practice, Hazel R. Parry, Felix J J A Bianchi, Nancy A. Schellhorn

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This study integrates field-based survey data with spatially-explicitsimulation modelling to assess the relative benefits of different landscapemanagement strategies for sustainable agricultural practice. We focus on the roleof native vegetation remnants in Australian agricultural landscapes in harbouringpests and beneficial insects for Integrated Pest Management (IPM). Nativevegetation remnants exist in most agricultural regions of Australia, although theirextent and composition varies greatly. Field-based surveys conducted in 2010 and2011 across three states provide important information on source habitats for pestsand natural enemies and their movement between habitats during the croppingseason. Building on this novel information, spatially-explicit simulation models wereconstructed integrating natural enemy life history …

Optimal Sequencing Of Water Supply Options At The Regional Scale Incorporating Sustainability, Uncertainty And Robustness, Eva H. Y. Beh, Holger R. Maier, Graeme C. Dandy

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Planning sustainable urban water supplies requires the use of a longtermplanning horizon and multiple criteria for assessment, all of which have inherentuncertainties and difficulties. This paper presents the application of an optimizationframework incorporating a post-optimization robustness assessment to the case studyof the southern Adelaide water supply system to determine its effectiveness. Variouswater supply alternatives (i.e. reservoirs, desalination plant, rainwater tank, and waterreuse schemes) are considered. Additionally, a 90 year planning horizon and twocompeting sustainability objectives, including the minimization of economic cost andgreenhouse gas emissions, are adopted. In order to determined the robustness of theoptimal solutions in the face of a …

Sustainability Indicators For River Water Quality Management In Urban Areas, C. Gualtieri, P. Amparo López-Jiménez

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

In developed countries, the main problem of water management is the incompatibility between the average water quality, on the one hand, and the needs for ecosystem protection and the desirable water use or uses (i.e. recreation, water supply, agriculture, etc.), on the other. To achieve qualitative levels compatible with these two objectives, engineering controls are devised; such water quality criteria are often expressed by acceptable values of the parameters which represent health condition for the ecosystem. This is also taken into account in European and National legislations. These parameters could be easily linked to the concept of sustainability. Sustainable water …

Mobility – A Panacea For Pastoralism? An Ecological-Economic Modelling Approach., Gunnar Dressler, Birgit Mueller, Karin Frank

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Nomadic systems around the world are subject to changes in economic, social and climatic conditions. Often traditional tenure regimes based on ethnolineages have been transformed to privatized pastoral systems with individual access regimes. Mobility, a basic principle of nomadic life, is undergoing fundamental changes: On the one hand side the loss of mobility and increased sedentarisation is widely discussed topic, but on the other hand, the introduction of new transportation technologies like trucks or new forms of communication and the availability of weather forecasts have led to an almost instantaneous availability of knowledge for the pastoralists and the possibility to …

Optimal Sequencing Of Water Supply Options At The Regional Scale Incorporating Sustainability, Uncertainty And Robustness, Eva H. Y. Beh, Holger R. Maier, Graeme C. Dandy

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Planning sustainable urban water supplies requires the use of a longtermplanning horizon and multiple criteria for assessment, all of which have inherentuncertainties and difficulties. This paper presents the application of an optimizationframework incorporating a post-optimization robustness assessment to the case studyof the southern Adelaide water supply system to determine its effectiveness. Variouswater supply alternatives (i.e. reservoirs, desalination plant, rainwater tank, and waterreuse schemes) are considered. Additionally, a 90 year planning horizon and twocompeting sustainability objectives, including the minimization of economic cost andgreenhouse gas emissions, are adopted. In order to determined the robustness of theoptimal solutions in the face of a …

Trading-Off Economics And Sustainability In Optimizing Brownfield Redevelopment, Maximilian Morio, Sebastian Schädler, Michael Finkel

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The reuse of underused or abandoned contaminated land, so-called brownfields,is increasingly seen as an important means for the reduction of land consumptionand natural resources. For a long time decisions on suitable reuse options havebeen predominantly shaped by economic considerations. Recently issues of sustainabledevelopment have gained more and more importance, and have added complexity tothe topic. Using a novel simulation-optimization framework for spatially explicit planningand integrated assessment of brownfield redevelopment (BR) options, this study demonstrateshow the trade-off between economic goals and sustainable development in theregional context may influence what is chosen as the most appropriate reuse option.A multi-criteria genetic algorithm allows …

Utilization Of Openmi For Calculation Of Material Flows In The Tool For Sustainability Impact Assessment (Tosia), Tommi Suominen, Sergey Zudin, Marcus Lindner, P. J. F. M. Verweij

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Sustainability impact assessment (SIA) studies how factors such as policy, management or technology development affect the sustainability of a sector or a chain of value adding processes and helps decision-makers to assess impacts of decision alternatives. The Tool for Sustainability Impact Assessment (ToSIA) was developed as a transparent platform for assessing the sustainability impacts of changes in Forest Wood Chains (FWC). The adopted approach is flexible and can thus be applied to other similar domains and the scope of analysis can be defined by the user. Target users of the tool and its assessments include scientists, consultants and policy makers. …

Evaluation As A Tool To Support Decision Making In Municipal Waste Recycling System For Thailand Sustainable Environment, Vilas Nitivattananon, Yuthtapong Wattanalapa

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This paper presents part of the results from a research project aimed atevaluating municipal waste recycling programs, supported by Thailand Institute ofPackaging and Recycling Management for Sustainable Environment in collaboration withother recycling program partners in Thailand. The study applied sustainable municipalsolid waste (MSW) management approach and program evaluation concepts. Theevaluation design includes two main levels. At country level, a survey using aquestionnaire was carried out to investigate perceptions on factors influencing success ofrepresentative samples including community recyclable banks (CRBs) and schoolrecyclable banks (SRBs). A waste stream analysis at city level was conducted to examinethe composition of waste at different selected …

Design And Development Of S.O.L.E. Software, Daryl H. Hepting

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The acronym SOLE (Sustainable Organic Local Ethical) has been applied to food, forwhich it signifies the highest standard. In an age when sustainability has become critically importantin so many human endeavours, this paper examines the question of whether SOLE can bemeaningfully used to signify software of the highest standard. This paper examines how it mightbe possible to think of software as sustainable, organic, local, and ethical. Should environmentalsoftware, in particular, strive for this high standard? Design and development of SOLE softwareare also considered.

Analysis Of The Economic Sustainability Of Companies In The Water Sector, Lyubomir Halachev, A. Guergachi, Yashodhan Athavale, Sri Krishnan

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Many recent studies look at the issue of sustainability from the environmental and the social points of view. This paper takes a different approach and proposes to look at the economic stability of organizations in the water sector. It analyzes a set of 140 companies from around the world involved in this sector, and attempts to develop a methodology to find out, based on stock market data only, which ones will likely remain active in the foreseeable future, and which ones will likely "die" out. This methodology uses machine learning techniques to handle the stock price time series of companies …

A Taguchi-Based Method For Assessing Data Center Sustainability, Sidney L. Pendelberry, Sophie Ying Chen Su, Michael Thurston

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This paper presents a methodology for measuring sustainability performance ofdata center facilities. Treating data center operation as a continuous production process, aTaguchi framework is used to estimate the sustainability impact due to power utilizationfrom the facility by calculating the loss to society as the facilities power utilizationbecomes less efficient than the Environmental Protection Agency’s guidelines. By trackingdata center sustainability performance with continuous production process metrics, it iseasy to identify and study performance characteristics, which if out of specification, havebroader environmental impacts. This method evaluates the data center’s excess energyconsumption as a performance quality control issue, and estimates the cost of …

Empathy: A Unifying Approach To Address The Dilemma Of 'Environment Versus Economy', A. Guergachi, O. Ngenyama, V. Magness, J. Hakim

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

When environmentalists warned, back in the 1970s, against pesticides andfertilizers, the then United States Secretary of Agriculture retorted that “before we go backto organic agriculture, somebody is going to have to decide what 50 million people we aregoing to let starve”. This exchange is nothing but an illustration of the dilemmatic choicethat societies in general have been asked to make: “develop the economy” or “protect theenvironment”. This paper proposes an integrated framework to resolve the dilemma of'environment versus economy'. This framework unfolds the essential characteristics ofsustainable societies and outlines the mechanics that underlie sustainable development.Referred to as ‘General Theory of …

Evaluation As A Tool To Support Decision Making In Municipal Waste Recycling System For Thailand Sustainable Environment, Vilas Nitivattananon, Yuthtapong Wattanalapa

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This paper presents part of the results from a research project aimed atevaluating municipal waste recycling programs, supported by Thailand Institute ofPackaging and Recycling Management for Sustainable Environment in collaboration withother recycling program partners in Thailand. The study applied sustainable municipalsolid waste (MSW) management approach and program evaluation concepts. Theevaluation design includes two main levels. At country level, a survey using aquestionnaire was carried out to investigate perceptions on factors influencing success ofrepresentative samples including community recyclable banks (CRBs) and schoolrecyclable banks (SRBs). A waste stream analysis at city level was conducted to examinethe composition of waste at different selected …

Design And Development Of S.O.L.E. Software, Daryl H. Hepting

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The acronym SOLE (Sustainable Organic Local Ethical) has been applied to food, forwhich it signifies the highest standard. In an age when sustainability has become critically importantin so many human endeavours, this paper examines the question of whether SOLE can bemeaningfully used to signify software of the highest standard. This paper examines how it mightbe possible to think of software as sustainable, organic, local, and ethical. Should environmentalsoftware, in particular, strive for this high standard? Design and development of SOLE softwareare also considered.