Food, Energy And Water Systems Research Articles

Prospects and challenges of regional modeling frameworks to inform planning for food, energy, and water systems: Views of modelers and stakeholders

Multisectoral models of regional bio-physical systems simulate policy responses to climate change and support climate mitigation and adaptation planning at multiple scales. Challenges facing these efforts include sometimes weak understandings of causal relationships, lack of integrated data streams, spatial and temporal incongruities with policy interests, and how to incorporate dynamics associated with human values, governance structures, and vulnerable populations. There are two general approaches to developing integrated models. The first involves stakeholder involvement in model design -- a participatory modeling approach. The second is to integrate existing models. This can be done in two ways: by integrating existing models or by a soft-linked confederation of existing models. A benefit of utilizing existing models is the leveraging of validated and familiar models that provide credibility. We report opportunities and challenges manifested in one effort to develop a regional food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) modeling framework using existing bio-physical models. The C-FEWS modeling framework (Climate-induced extremes on the linked food, energy, water system) is intended to identify and evaluate response options to extreme weather in the Midwest and Northeast United States thru the year 2100. We interviewed ten modelers associated with development of the C-FEWS framework and ten stakeholders from government agencies, planning agencies, and non-governmental organizations in New England. We inquired about their perspectives on the roles and challenges of regional FEWS modeling frameworks to inform planning and information needed to support planning in integrated food, energy, and water systems. We also analyzed discussions of meetings among modelers and among stakeholders and modelers. These sources reveal many agreements among modelers and stakeholders about the role of modeling frameworks, their benefits for policymakers, and the types of outputs they should produce. They also identify challenges to developing regional modeling frameworks that couple existing models and balancing model capabilities with stakeholder preferences for information. The results indicate the importance of modelers and stakeholders engaging in dialogue to craft modeling frameworks and scenarios that are credible and relevant for policymakers. We reflect on the implications for how FEWS modeling frameworks comprised of existing bio-physical models can be designed to better inform policy making at the regional scale.

The C-FEWS framework: Supporting studies of climate-induced extremes on food, energy, and water systems at the regional scale

Climate change continues to challenge food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) across the globe and will figure prominently in shaping future decisions on how best to manage this nexus. In turn, traditionally engineered and natural infrastructures jointly support and hence determine FEWS performance, their vulnerabilities, and their resilience in light of extreme climate events. We present here a research framework to advance the modeling, data integration, and assessment capabilities that support hypothesis-driven research on FEWS dynamics cast at the macro-regional scale. The framework was developed to support studies on climate-induced extremes on food, energy, and water systems (C-FEWS) and designed to identify and evaluate response options to extreme climate events in the context of managing traditionally engineered (TEI) and nature-based infrastructures (NBI). This paper presents our strategy for a first stage of research using the framework to analyze contemporary FEWS and their sensitivity to climate drivers shaped by historical conditions (1980–2019). We offer a description of the computational framework, working definitions of the climate extremes analyzed, and example configurations of numerical experiments aimed at evaluating the importance of individual and combined driving variables. Single and multiple factor experiments involving the historical time series enable two categories of outputs to be analyzed: the first involving biogeophysical entities (e.g., crop production, carbon sequestered, nutrient and thermal pollution loads) and the second reflecting a portfolio of services provided by the region’s TEI and NBI, evaluated in economic terms. The framework is exercised in a series of companion papers in this special issue that focus on the Northeast and Midwest regions of the United States. Use of the C-FEWS framework to simulate historical conditions facilitates research to better identify existing FEWS linkages and how they function. The framework also enables a next stage of analysis to be pursued using future scenario pathways that will vary land use, technology deployments, regulatory objectives, and climate trends and extremes. It also supports a stakeholder engagement effort to co-design scenarios of interest beyond the research domain.

Thinking Big and Thinking Small: A Conceptual Framework for Best Practices in Community and Stakeholder Engagement in Food, Energy, and Water Systems

Community and stakeholder engagement is increasingly recognized as essential to science at the nexus of food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) to address complex issues surrounding food and energy production and water provision for society. Yet no comprehensive framework exists for supporting best practices in community and stakeholder engagement for FEWS. A review and meta-synthesis were undertaken of a broad range of existing models, frameworks, and toolkits for community and stakeholder engagement. A framework is proposed that comprises situational awareness of the FEWS place or problem, creation of a suitable culture for engagement, focus on power-sharing in the engagement process, co-ownership, co-generation of knowledge and outcomes, the technical process of integration, the monitoring processes of reflective and reflexive experiences, and formative evaluation. The framework is discussed as a scaffolding for supporting the development and application of best practices in community and stakeholder engagement in ways that are arguably essential for sound FEWS science and sustainable management.

Agent-Based Modeling for Integrating Human Behavior into the Food–Energy–Water Nexus

The nexus of food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) has become a salient research topic, as well as a pressing societal and policy challenge. Computational modeling is a key tool in addressing these challenges, and FEWS modeling as a subfield is now established. However, social dimensions of FEWS nexus issues, such as individual or social learning, technology adoption decisions, and adaptive behaviors, remain relatively underdeveloped in FEWS modeling and research. Agent-based models (ABMs) have received increasing usage recently in efforts to better represent and integrate human behavior into FEWS research. A systematic review identified 29 articles in which at least two food, energy, or water sectors were explicitly considered with an ABM and/or ABM-coupled modeling approach. Agent decision-making and behavior ranged from reactive to active, motivated by primarily economic objectives to multi-criteria in nature, and implemented with individual-based to highly aggregated entities. However, a significant proportion of models did not contain agent interactions, or did not base agent decision-making on existing behavioral theories. Model design choices imposed by data limitations, structural requirements for coupling with other simulation models, or spatial and/or temporal scales of application resulted in agent representations lacking explicit decision-making processes or social interactions. In contrast, several methodological innovations were also noted, which were catalyzed by the challenges associated with developing multi-scale, cross-sector models. Several avenues for future research with ABMs in FEWS research are suggested based on these findings. The reviewed ABM applications represent progress, yet many opportunities for more behaviorally rich agent-based modeling in the FEWS context remain.

Developing leaders to tackle wicked problems at the nexus of food, energy, and water systems

The multiscale, complex challenges at the nexus of food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) demand approaches to graduate education beyond traditional disciplinary training. Here, we present a vision for training FEWS leaders developed by faculty and students from interdisciplinary graduate training programs focused on the FEWS nexus. We discuss the imperative to create interdisciplinary, next-generation FEWS leaders and the core skills and proficiencies such leaders need: employ systems thinking, thrive in interdisciplinary teams, communicate effectively, and engage diverse stakeholders and communities. These skills will prepare students to connect science to innovative, actionable solutions and to successfully lead across a variety of careers. Graduate training that integrates these approaches must, on the one hand, overcome structural, cultural, and financial barriers in higher education, but on the other hand, will help develop a community of practice capable of developing sustainable solutions for the FEWS nexus and other vexing environmental challenges.

The Development of the INFEWS-ER: A Virtual Resource Center for Transdisciplinary Graduate Student Training at the Nexus of Food, Energy, and Water

Problems at the nexus of Food, Energy and Water Systems (FEWS) are among the most complex challenges we face. Spanning simple to complex temporal, geographic, social, and political framings, the questions raised at this nexus require multi-disciplinary if not transdisciplinary approaches. Answers to these questions must draw from engineering, the physical and biological sciences, and the social sciences. Practical solutions depend upon a wide community of stakeholders, including industry, policy-makers, and the general public. Yet there are many obstacles to working in a transdisciplinary environment: unfamiliar concepts, specialized terminology, and countless 'blind' spots. Graduate education occurs in disciplinary 'silos', often with little regard for the unintended consequences of our research. Existing pedagogical models do not usually train students to understand neighboring disciplines, thus limiting student learning to narrow areas of expertise, and obstructing their potential for transdisciplinary discourse over their careers. Our goal is a virtual resource center—the INFEWS-ER—that provides educational opportunities to supplement graduate students, especially in their development of transdisciplinary competences. Addressing the grand challenges at the heart of the FEWS nexus will depend upon such competence. Students and scholars from diverse disciplines are working together to develop the INFEWS-ER. To date, we have sponsored both a workshop and a symposium to identify priorities to design the initial curriculum. We have also conducted surveys of the larger community of FEWS researchers. Our work confirms a widespread interest in transdisciplinary training and helps to identify core themes and promising pedagogical approaches. Our curriculum now centers upon several 'Cohort Challenges', supported by various 'Toolbox Modules' organized around key themes (e.g., communicating science). We plan to initiate the first cohort of students in October of 2018. Students who successfully complete their Cohort Challenges will be certified as the FEW Graduate Scholars. In this paper, we describe the development of this curriculum. We begin with the need for training in transdisciplinary research. We then describe the workshop and symposium, as well as our survey results. We conclude with an outline of the curriculum, including the current Cohort Challenges and Toolbox Modules.

Resilient by design: the case for increasing resilience of buildings and their linked food-energy-water systems

The resilience of buildings and food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) to natural or manmade disruptions are closely linked. The resilience of a building goes beyond the safety of its structural elements and must include the resilience of its supporting systems and the services they supply. The resilience of FEWS, in turn, can increase through design elements of a building that affect generation and storage of FEW resources. In this commentary, I discuss increasing the resilience of buildings and their linked FEWS—improving their resistance, absorption, restoration, and adaptive capacities—through new integrated systems design practices. I begin with a discussion of the current state of building design at the FEW nexus. I then use the prior establishment and current use of sustainability design objectives as an analogue to developing and implementing resilience design objectives. I review progress and limitations of specific drivers for increasing resilient design practices, including economic incentives, regulations, extralegal programs and initiatives, and societal incentives. My recommendations for leveraging these drivers to increase resilient design include: for economic incentives, quantify the costs and benefits to make the business case for resilience; for formal regulations, specify increased building requirements with performance-based resilience objectives; for extralegal initiatves, integrate these resilience objectives with existing certification programs and award designs that address FEWS as an integrated network rather than as disparate systems; and for societal incentives, demonstrate public benefit to shift societal perceptions of resilience. Together, these actions will motivate the design of more resilient building and FEW systems to increase their longevity, performance, and robustness.

A network framework for dynamic models of urban food, energy and water systems (FEWS)

The urban food system addressed here centers on urban food processing, distribution and consumption (including food packaging and waste disposal) and as such addresses how food moves from processing and distribution centers to points of consumption and ultimately waste disposal within cities. The Food‐Energy‐Water Systems (FEWS) Nexus extends to and through urban boundaries. Energy and water resource use are vital along these routes and are interdependent with one another and with food processing in ways that differ from those in agricultural production systems outside urban boundaries. This paper addresses how the urban food system affects the intensity of energy and water resource use and how these interdependencies can be altered by abrupt changes or extreme events. The urban food system is significantly affected by resource disruptions such as power outages, water contamination or disruption due to droughts or distribution line breakages. The system must be able to be resilient to these changes to be sustainable. FEWS flows and usage concepts presented in this paper are based on system characteristics analogous to one of the largest food distribution centers in the U.S. and the largest city, the Hunts Point Distribution Center in New York City. The Center handles a large share of the perishable food supply, involves numerous utilities that support one another, and a wide range of products, and thus provides a framework for evaluating urban FEWS relationships. In addition to direct energy for refrigeration, lighting, heating and cooling, indirect energy resources consumed by transportation systems that deliver food to Hunts Point exemplify interdependencies. Network models are used to describe scenarios for the interrelationships in the urban food system, including changes in the mix of resources due to conservation and other resource decisions as well as disruption of those resources in an extreme event. Selected food consumption and production practices are also considered. The modeling framework provides a generalizable network model that captures extreme weather event effects and enables the quantitative static and resilience analysis and planning. The extreme weather event component uses both static and dynamic formulations for resilience to portray changes in network topology and network changes over time respectively. The nodes of the network capture urban FEWS resources and the linkages between the nodes capture network characteristics. The network models that correspond to different scenarios are integrated to understand the interdependencies from processing through resource consumption as a basis to identify the patterns of interdependencies that lead to cascading failures, pinpoint nodes and links that are the weakest components of the network, and support resilience planning for the disruptive events. The analysis and design of the network will inform the planning and recovery policies to enhance the resiliency of the FEW critical infrastructures of New York City and potentially transferrable to other large urban areas and prepare them for future anticipated and unanticipated extreme events. The modeling used for the scenarios is considered generalizable to other areas and scalable to urban food systems of different sizes and configurations. © 2017 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 37: 122–131, 2018

Human adaptations in food, energy, and water systems

The impacts of recent natural disasters highlight the hidden vulnerabilities in society’s food, energy, and water systems and the potential for climate change to amplify these social liabilities. Some have pointed to technological solutions to reduce vulnerabilities and to build resiliency into food, energy, and water systems (FEWS). While technological advances to upgrade human systems, e.g., in agriculture, urban planning, pollution abatement, and green energy development, are critical, these technical advances are insufficient on their own. Effective FEWS management depends on understanding human decision-making, including adaptations to new environmental, social, or economic changes and the responses of individuals and communities to new technologies intended to improve FEWS resilience and sustainability. This paper draws on multiple social science perspectives, including decision science, economics, and sociology, to consider the fundamental role that human behavior and adaptations play in FEWS. We discuss the importance of accounting for human behavior within a coupled human-natural systems framework in which a range of human adaptations and feedbacks are considered, including how humans might respond directly to press-pulse dynamics and indirectly through their adoption of new technology. Following a brief summary of key concepts of decision-making theory at individual and community scales, we then focus on migration and land use changes, the two types of human adaptations that are particularly important for FEWS modeling and management. The paper concludes with a discussion of key knowledge gaps and research needs in the social sciences related to human adaptations in the context of FEWS.