104 research outputs found
Evaluating the Potential of Adopting a Water-Energy-Food Nexus Approach Toward Sustainable Development: A Case Study from Bangladesh
No full textIn pursuance of continuous economic development, Bangladesh has undertaken a couple of long-term plans, namely Bangladesh Delta Plan 2100 and Power System Master Plan 2016, to buttress its productivity in agriculture, energy, and industrial sectors, which are aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). In this study, the development endeavors of different ministries associated to water, energy and food of Bangladesh, projected for 2030 and 2041 was studied using Water-Energy-Food (WEF) nexus approach. Using the local resource usage characteristics of Bangladesh, a scenario-based assessment tool was developed following the 7 Question Guideline (7QG). It was found that either of the national priorities or global SDG indicators corresponding to food self-sufficiency, emission from energy and fresh water withdrawal, are hardly achievable with the limited internal water and land resources available. After carefully inspecting the trade-offs and synergies in water-energy-food cross-sectoral resource interactions, a set of scenarios, comprising of existing policy planning to alternative planning, has been developed for a comparative representation of highly connected to silo policy planning. Assessments from each scenario have been traced to national priorities and global SDG indicators to demonstrate which scenarios project more significant achievement of national goals. Unattainable scenarios were filtered following Socio-Technical-Economical-Political (STEP) 3 filter methodology. Feasible scenarios have been mapped back to the policies and connected ministries to point out the demanding coherency required for the implementation of such scenarios. Critical and potential interconnections among resource subsystems have been identified to point out the resource hotspots, stress, trade-offs, and synergies to explore future policy recommendations
Lessons learned: Creating an interdisciplinary team and using a nexus approach to address a resource hotspot
No full textMoving resource management and allocation away from sectoral silos to a paradigm founded in integration and leveraging cross-sectoral and trans-disciplinary synergies will result in expanded opportunities for economic development and improved social well-being (Mohtar, 2017; Mohtar and Daher, 2017). Interventions to address complex resource challenges must identify opportunities while cognizant of holistic, system level trade-offs (Daher and Mohtar, 2015; Daher et al., 2018a, b, c). These interventions must be contextualized locally: Texas has spatially varied water scarcity, energy resource abundance, and rapid population growth; in the northeastern United States water quality, drainage, and extreme weather events pose far greater challenges. While the overall system-of-systems quantification of water, energy, food and other interconnected systems remains similar across hotspots, the solutions to the challenges posed within each hotspot are bound by local knowledge, physical resource constraints, and governance challenges. This paper introduces the experience of the Texas A&M University Water-Energy-Food Nexus Initiative (WEFNI) in creating a University wide, three-year investigatory experience in which an interdisciplinary group addressed the resource challenges facing the San Antonio region. This Science of the Total Environment (STOTEN) Special Issue documents, in 9 distinct, yet complementary, research articles, the multiple dimensions of this resource hotspot. This paper reflects on the process of creating interdisciplinary teams and presents an overview of the questions and research conducted under thematic foci: data and modeling, trade-off analysis, water for food, water for energy, and governance. Lessons learned from the interdisciplinary experience are presented; potentially transferrable to addressing other resource hotspots within the US, and globally. © 2018 Elsevier B.V
Food for Thought: Nourishing Cardiovascular Health Amidst the Exposome
No full textThe cumulative exposures of an individual during their lifetime, known as the exposome, encompass environmental exposures and lifestyle factors that significantly impact cardiovascular health. The exposome concept aims to provide a comprehensive framework for understanding how various exposures combine to influence disease risk and health outcomes over a lifetime. Diet is a well-studied aspect of the exposome, recognized as a critical contributor to cardiovascular health and influencing various other health metrics and behaviors. Furthermore, understanding agricultural food systems and their interrelationships with dietary choice and impacts on environmental and human health requires a systems approach. Through a review of the literature, this publication will (1) elucidate the interconnections between the exposome and cardiovascular diseases through the lens of agricultural systems and environmental health; (2) examine the effect of diet on cardiovascular health; (3) examine the influence of socioeconomic and cultural factors on the agricultural food system and dietary choices; and (4) highlight the importance of adopting a systems approach that integrates dietary interventions with sustainable agricultural practices, emphasizing the need for holistic strategies to address the root causes of cardiovascular health issues through balanced human and environmental health interventions
Bridging Physical and Social Sciences to Unlock New Potential for Addressing Interconnected Resource Challenges
No full textAs urbanizing cities work toward sustainable resource planning, particular attention must be given to the interdependence of interconnected resource challenges. Coherent policies, strengthened by and consistent with, the research understanding of the challenges and their interdependencies, are necessary for sustainable resource allocation. Enabling Environments must be created that allow: 1) development of interdisciplinary research, 2) cross-sectoral stakeholder cooperation in planning resource allocations, and 3) appropriate levels of engagement and exchange of information between researchers and related stakeholders. This dissertation focuses on opportunities for bringing together the knowledge accumulated in understanding and quantifying the interconnections between resource systems with theories in social science and their application.
Building on common pool resources and collective action theory, the work uses social network analysis to understand the interactions between stakeholders governing interconnected resource systems. Using convergence theory, a methodology and criteria are developed for assessing the extent to which researchers and stakeholders tend to converge on topics related to the resource challenges, thereby reducing feedback cycles and increasing information exchange and support. This is accomplished through two surveys, in the context of a model resource hotspot in San Antonio, Texas: a growing, urbanizing population with major agricultural activity, situated above the Eagle Ford shale play���s growing hydraulic fracturing development.
The study���s main outcomes follow. 1) Identification of challenges faced in developing an interdisciplinary research team, i.e. defining the study region���s physical boundaries, establishing dependency relations between sub-groups, data incompatibilities, varying data access, and funding. 2) Modest levels of communication exist between water institutions, but very low levels of communication exist between water institutions and those responsible for food and energy decisions. Frequency of communication among officials at different water institutions was higher among those who participated in stakeholder engagement activities: significant only in the communication among water officials themselves. Main institutional barriers to higher levels of communication between cross sectoral stakeholders include finance, structure, capacity, or differences in language, interest and value systems. 3) Aspects of convergence were identified between the perspectives of researchers and regional stakeholders on issues of water, energy, and food in the San Antonio Region. Similar aspects of convergence were found in the perspectives of both groups regarding the Texas Water Development Board strategies with the greatest or least potential. Both groups converged on water as a first priority, but not on their perspective of the direction of future regional priorities: they differed in their rankings of energy and food (second and third priorities). The study also indicated convergence regarding potential roles of ���increased communication��� and ���information sharing between agencies��� as a means to improve cooperation and address interconnected resource challenges. To realize these potentials, institutional mechanisms and finances for such activities should be revisited: addressing communication barriers is critical to developing cooperative stakeholder environments that allow long-term planning for resource allocation that avoids potentially unintended consequences
Water, energy, and food nexus: A basis for strategic planning for natural resources
No full textOur global community is facing unprecedented risks and challenges that are directly linked to the way we currently understand and manage our resources. Providing sustainable solutions to overcome present challenges poses the need to study the existent interlinkages between these resources. This paper presents water, energy, and food as main systems that form a nexus, which itself is affected by defined external factors. The nature of the intimate relation between water, energy, and food forces a paradigm shift in the management approach; moving from silos to more integrative approaches. This paper further introduces a new proposed scenario-based framework and set of methodologies that not only define and discover the level of interconnectedness between water, energy and food, but provides explicit quantifications for them. It is used as a base for a multidimensional tool that quantifies resource demands according to proposed scenario variations. Data from Qatar is used for a case study to help evaluate the proposed tool structure and its overall performance. Sustainability Index criteria and utility are introduced as a way of identifying locally favorable scenarios. The presented WEF nexus framework and tool provide a dynamic model for systematic integration of resources in the planning and decision making processes. Promoting integrative thinking in the process of strategic planning comes through highlighting the intimate level of interconnectedness between these systems
Water International Water-Energy-Food Nexus Framework for facilitating multi-stakeholder dialogue Water-Energy-Food Nexus Framework for facilitating multi-stakeholder dialogue
No full textInvestigating the Potential of Engaging the Catholic Community of San Antonio, Tx in Sustainable Interventions
No full textIn recent decades, there has been a greater push by the Catholic Church for its members to engage its doctrine on environmental stewardship and social justice with regards to prevailing environmental crises. Following the Pope���s encyclical Laudato Si���, the Laudato Si��� Action Platform has been set up to encourage concrete environmental stewardship and social justice actions by Catholic individuals and organizations. San Antonio, TX is a particular locale where water-energy-food resources are in high demand and where the Catholic population is significant (33%). Using a water-energy-food nexus analysis and demographic studies, the feasibility of engaging Catholic individuals in San Antonio, TX on some of the interventions suggested by the Platform is studied. The interventions are evaluated by their resource-use footprints: water, energy, food, carbon emissions, land area, and cost. The most effective interventions include transitioning the average diet to one which is more plant-based and less meat-based, food waste reduction, and decreasing personal vehicular travel. Adjustments based on acceptance rates of each intervention by the Catholic population can have a significant effect on the sustainability of each intervention. Cumulative effects of intervention adoption across the population are more impressive than individual effects
Beyond zero sum game allocations: expanding resources potentials through reduced interdependencies and increased resource nexus synergies
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