Challenges and opportunities of knowledge co-creation for the water-energy-land nexus

Abstract

The pressure on natural resources including water, energy and land is continuously growing through changes in climate and land use. Representatives of academia, industry, governments and society need to join forces in order to develop new pathways towards sustainable natural resource use and management. Such pathways start from the basic idea that natural resources are finite and interlinked and that human activities can affect these resources and links, with partly irreversible effects. We combine the water–energy–land nexus and the climate services concept and present a cross-sectoral approach of knowledge co-creation to inform natural resource use and management. The approach is tested in three case studies across Europe that face different challenges resulting from climate and socio-economic change. We present the process, applied methods and major results of knowledge co-creation for sustainable natural resource use and management, and we reflect on the challenges and opportunities from engaging multiple stakeholders. Even if a comprehensive, cross-sectoral approach encourages embedding the water–energy–land nexus into climate services and allows the development of pathways towards sustainable natural resource use and management, maintaining these achievements and partnerships beyond the lifetime of a research project remains challenging.