Multi-stakeholder Scenarios Research Articles

Towards decentralized resource management for disasters: NGO-RMSD

The necessity for an efficient resource management system during and postdisaster is underscored by the prevalent coordination and resource management challenges faced by various organizations, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and government units. To address these problems, our system proposal introduces NGO-RMSD, a blockchain-based decentralized system designed to enhance collaborative efforts during and after disasters. Utilizing the Quorum framework for its energy efficiency, NGO-RMSD enables seamless transactions and updates across parties, eliminating intermediaries and fostering a trusted environment for resource management. This paper details the development of this decentralized system, incorporating smart contracts for autonomous operation. Decentralized systems provide superior security, transparency, and immutability, making them fundamentally more robust and efficient than centralized systems for managing complex, multi-stakeholder scenarios like dis-aster response. This decentralized model ensures transparency, eliminates intermediaries, and enables all parties to conduct transactions and updates reliably. These contracts effectively assess and prioritize the needs of affected individuals, ensuring timely and accurate resource allocation. A proof of concept has been implemented, demonstrating the practicality and potential impact of NGO-RMSD. Designed in alignment with NGO's field requirements and distributed under a free software license, this system promises to significantly improve coordination for disaster resource management. Possible improvements and future work for a more sustainable system is discussed. Looking forward, we aim to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of disaster relief efforts by providing assistance to a larger number of affected individuals in a more organized and expeditious manner.

Optimal allocation of bi-level energy storage based on the dynamic ancillary service price

A bi-level optimization model was proposed in multi-stakeholder scenarios considering energy storage ancillary services to coordinate the optimal configuration between power grid and wind and solar energy storage power stations. The upper and lower levels were optimized to minimize the power grid operation cost and wind and solar energy storage station cost, respectively. A dynamic pricing mechanism was proposed to efficiently coordinate the upper and lower levels and accomplish the optimal configuration of the energy storage capacity. The upper layer determines the price and communicates it to the lower layer, while the lower layer optimizes the energy storage scale and operation plan according to the price and feeds it back to the upper layer. The optimal price and the optimal configuration of energy storage participating in ancillary service market were obtained using CPLEX. Finally, the performance of the model was validated by evaluating actual power grid operating data from a provincial power system.

Blockchain-based trust management collaborative system for transport multi-stakeholder scenarios

A trend in future networks (i.e., beyond 5G and 6G) is the increasing virtualization and disaggregation of networks (i.e., Open Radio Access Network, network function virtulization/software-defined networking, or disaggregated optical networks, among others). This trend leads to a multi-vendor situation appearing in the telco arena (i.e., hardware suppliers, software function providers, vendors, operators) that communications service providers will need to deal with. This multi-stakeholder scenario complicates provisioning and the established relationships among actors based on operation agreements that define the requirements, penalties, and prices that generate a certain level of trust among them. This new disaggregated scenario implies an increment of possibilities and relationships, requiring agreements to be created in a run-time way. As the agreement is generated ad hoc, selecting a provider is a crucial decision, and so, trust and transparency are keys to help with this decision. As trust is a human/subjective concept, it is necessary to find a way to convert it into an objective parameter that can be used in an analytical field such as network control and management. This paper aims to present a model to compute the reputation of a provider based on a set of specific and measurable parameters and the use of Blockchain to make all of the process transparent and reliable to all players involved. Furthermore, this paper shows the design for a Blockchain-based Trust Manager that can compute and distribute the reputation and trust parameters to define how trustworthy are the multi-stakeholders. Finally, an experimental validation is presented on top of an optical transport network.

Actor groups influencing and shaping sustainable microalgae value chains in Europe

Microalgae are an evolving field to produce sustainable nutritious food with low environmental impact. To shape the emerging European value chain in a sustainable way, all actors and processes need to be considered. This article builds on the results of multi-stakeholder scenario workshops organised within the EC-H2020-funded project ProFuture. It investigates the roles different actors along the microalgae value chain hold to shape it. A qualitative analysis identified three actor groups: (1) microalgae producers and processors, and researchers who work with microalgae and their development, (2) policy makers, and large industrial players, who influence the political and economic possibilities of the microalgae value chain and (3) consumers, who play a key role in order to root sustainable microalgae food products in the market. The paper shows how these groups interlink and draws conclusions about their roles for shaping the European microalgae value chain.

Future of mobility in Jakarta Metropolitan Area: A Multi-Stakeholder scenario planning

The growth of the urban population and their mobility, added with the COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts, requires the capability to anticipate uncertainties. As a developing country, Indonesia has progressed with many developments in urban mobility, but at the same time, challenges still may affect its future, particularly in a metropolitan like Jakarta. Despite the widely understood challenges faced by the metropolitan, there has been limited understanding about its possible futures of mobility and the ways to go in its respective future. A multi-stakeholder scenario planning was used to develop future scenarios of urban mobility in Jakarta Metropolitan Area (JMA), utilizing stakeholders’ point of views regarding the driving forces and critical uncertainties that may shape the future of mobility to create action-oriented strategies to achieve the desired future. A medium-term time scale of ten years (2021–2030) was used to give viable and practical recommendations. Four scenarios were developed, which consisted of: 1) one seamless ecosystem, 2) the culture of public transportation, 3) the exclusive green community, and 4) the social dilemma of public versus private transportation, which emphasized the forms of mobility that would dominate in the next ten years. With implications of each scenario explained from several aspects, six efforts should be considered to direct the future of mobility in Jakarta Metropolitan Area: vehicle electrification, limitation of fossil fuel vehicles and broader use of public transportation, implementation of MaaS and TOD, commuters’ behavior changes with push and pull policies, and boosting funding for mobility facilities.

MobiWise: Eco-routing decision support leveraging the Internet of Things

Eco-routing distributes traffic in cities to improve mobility sustainability. The implementation of eco-routing in real-life requires a diverse set of information, including different kinds of sensors. These sensors are often already integrated in city infrastructure, some are technologically outdated, and are often operated by multiple entities. In this work, we provide a use case-oriented system design for an eco-routing service leveraging Internet-of-Things (IoT) technologies. The methodology involves six phases: (1) defining an eco-routing use case for a vehicle fleet; (2) formulating a routing problem as a multi-objective optimisation to divert traffic at a relevant hub facility; (3) identifying data sources and processing required information; (4) proposing a microservice-based architecture leveraging IoT technologies adequate to a multi-stakeholder scenario; (5) applying a microscopic traffic simulator as a digital twin to deal with data sparsity; and (6) visually illustrating eco-routing trade-offs to support decision making. We built a proof-of-concept for a mid-sized European city. Using real data and a calibrated digital twin, we would achieve hourly total emissions reductions up to 2.1%, when applied in a car fleet composed of 5% of eco-routing vehicles. This traffic diversion would allow annual carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxides savings of 400 tons and 1.2 tons, respectively.

Coordinating Flexible Demand Response and Renewable Uncertainties for Scheduling of Community Integrated Energy Systems With an Electric Vehicle Charging Station: A Bi-Level Approach

A community integrated energy system (CIES) with an electric vehicle charging station (EVCS) provides a new way for tackling growing concerns of energy efficiency and environmental pollution, it is a critical task to coordinate flexible demand response and multiple renewable uncertainties. To this end, a novel bi-level optimal dispatching model for the CIES with an EVCS in multi-stakeholder scenarios is established in this paper. In this model, an integrated demand response program is designed to promote a balance between energy supply and demand while maintaining a user comprehensive satisfaction within an acceptable range. To further tap the potential of demand response through flexibly guiding users' energy consumption and electric vehicles' behaviors (charging, discharging and providing spinning reserves), a dynamic pricing mechanism combining time-of-use and real-time pricing is put forward. In the solution phase, by using sequence operation theory (SOT), the original chance-constrained programming (CCP) model is converted into a readily solvable mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) formulation and finally solved by CPLEX solver. The simulation results on a practical CIES located in North China demonstrate that the presented method manages to balance the interests between CIES and EVCS via the coordination of flexible demand response and uncertain renewables.

An experimental publish-subscribe monitoring assessment to Beyond 5G networks

The fifth generation (5G) of mobile networks is designed to accommodate different types of use cases, each of them with different and stringent requirements and key performance indicators (KPIs). To support the optimization of the network performance and validation of the KPIs, there exist the necessity of a flexible and efficient monitoring system and capable of realizing multi-site and multi-stakeholder scenarios. Nevertheless, for the evolution from 5G to 6G, the network is envisioned as a user-driven, distributed Cloud computing system where the resource pool is foreseen to integrate the participating users. In this paper, we present a distributed monitoring architecture for Beyond 5G multi-site platforms, where different stakeholders share the resource pool in a distributed environment. Taking advantage of the usage of publish-subscribe mechanisms adapted to the Edge, the developed lightweight monitoring solution can manage large amounts of real-time traffic generated by the applications located in the resource pool. We assess the performance of the implemented paradigm, revealing some interesting insights about the platform, such as the effect caused by the throughput of monitoring data in performance parameters such as the latency and packet loss, or the presence of a saturation effect due to software limitations that impacts in the performance of the system under specific conditions. In the end, the performance evaluation process has confirmed that the monitoring platform suits the requirements of the proposed scenarios, being capable of handling similar workloads in real 5G and Beyond 5G scenarios, then discussing how the architecture could be mapped to these real scenarios.

A green scenario for sustainable landscape planning: the case study in Sintang Regency, West Kalimantan Province

Sintang Regency is one of the 12 regencies and two cities in West Kalimantan Province, Indonesia. The total area of this regency is approximately 2.2 million hectares (ha) with 59% of the area designated as state forest area which provides high biodiversity and environmental services for adjoining communities. Through multi-stakeholder scenario planning, the government of Sintang Regency committed to protect and preserve forest resources for long-term landscape planning and sustainable utilization. Scenario planning yielded two possible outcomes in 2030 called “green” and “business as usual” (BAU) scenarios. Under the green scenario, future development without deforestation and land permits complied with spatial planning while under the BAU scenario, future conditions will be the result of past conditions without interventions. This study aimed to analyze land-use change in the regency over the past ten years. By applying the Terrset Land Change Modeller (LCM) algorithm, this study predicted the land use and carbon stock change of both scenarios in 2030. Three steps to apply the LCM are by analyzing the changes based on past history, modeling the transition potential and predicting the changes. Time series data of land cover data from 2006 to 2016 were used for this analysis. The results indicated that a green scenario prevents to stop deforestation about 117,136 ha (more than 5%) compared to the BAU scenario. Furthermore, the green scenario prevents the emission of 5 million tons of carbon (tC) for the regency indicating that the multi-stakeholder scenario planning process can be an effective strategy to preserve land and forest resources and promote sustainable development planning. The green scenario requires to prevent deforestation and limit the expansion of plantation areas, which are only allowed inside the current cultivation license and permit areas.

SOMERSET-P: a GIS-based/MCDA platform for strategic planning scenarios’ ranking and decision-making in conflictual socioecosystem

This contribution proposes an application of the SOMERSET-P platform for strategic environmental assessment of regional planning scenarios related to the municipality of Ste-Claire (Quebec, Canada). The platform combines spatial analysis and multicriteria decision-aid support and is supplied with data from several stakeholder expectations and planning issues. Stakeholders are modeled according to the following five groups: “Owners” (civil administration representatives), Farmers, Foresters, Environmentalists, and Neo-rural dwellers. Each scenario was built according to a hierarchy of planning objectives. Scenarios were assessed in accordance with 12 decision criteria and related indicators of performance. The spatial translation and spatial analysis of the territorial impacts of the scenarios are performed within the ArcGIS geographic information system. These scenarios were integrated into multicriteria and multi-stakeholders analysis software implementing the PROMETHEE/GAIA methodology. Four elements were computed to support the stakeholder negotiations and decision analysis: scenario strengths and weaknesses, individual and multi-stakeholder scenario rankings, and visual analysis of conflicts and synergies between criteria, and between stakeholders. Results suggest that a potential compromise is located in-between the full economic growth and the ecological scenarios. Since regional planning processes are becoming increasingly complex with time due to the group polarization and the emergence of conflictual societal value schemes among stakeholders hierarchical and networked relations approaches involving multiple stakeholders like this one are fully justified in the future.

Repertoires of collaboration: incorporation of social media help requests into the common operating picture

ABSTRACTDisasters present us with dynamic and emergent multi-stakeholder scenarios. Complex decision-making is supported by Emergency Management Organisation (EMO) ‘command and control’ disaster response systems that if pushed to failure, present problems in the development and monitoring of situational awareness. Nowhere is this more evident than when the general public use social media platforms to report crisis incidents when the official emergency management hotline (e.g. Triple Zero (000) in Australia) is overwhelmed or not available. This causes a number of issues for EMO as it is difficult to verify and determine the accuracy and veracity of social media posts and how to best incorporate the information within them into situational awareness for the assessment of and response to, an emergency incident. This paper analyses interview data from five Australian EMO that outlines and discusses these issues in detail. As a result of this analysis, we suggest that developing a supplementary ‘repertoires of collaboration’ approach to incorporating social media posts into the development of situational awareness during a disaster event, would help improve disaster response outcomes. We then recommend a way forward through the application of the Negotiated Arrangements for the Common Operating Picture (COP) in Extreme Events framework.

Joint Operation of Renewable Energy and Battery Switch Station Considering the Benefits of Different Subjects

The collaboration between renewable energy (RE) and an electric vehicles battery switch station (BSS) is a win-win strategy for both. In order to effectively coordinate and manage RE and BSS belonging to different investors, a new cooperative operation mode considering a multi-stakeholder scenario is proposed. By analyzing the relationship of cooperation and competition between them, their pursuit of maximizing their own interests is modeled as a Stackelberg game model. As the leader, the RE company determines the charge/discharge prices to guide the demand response of BSS. As the follower, the BSS optimizes its charge/discharge strategy according to the prices to maximize its own profits. The proposed model no longer requires that the RE company and BSS belong to a same interest subject, and there is no need for unified coordinated control between them. To solve the game equilibrium, a solution combining the backward-induction method and genetic algorithm is proposed by comparing and analyzing the characteristics of the strong and weak Stackelberg equilibriums. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed model was validated by case studies. The simulation results show that both the RE company and the BSS have the motivation to participate in the game, and that a win-win outcome can be achieved automatically in the process of pursuing their own interest maximization in the game.

Toward a Sustainable Future: The Case of the Municipality of Milan

In the new framework of the Psychology of sustainability and sustainable development, this paper addresses the issue of building socially sustainable processes to develop a better quality of life in an urban context. The aim is to explore and highlight the connection between the acknowledgment of a pluralistic and multi-stakeholder scenario, the entwined implications for sustainability at different levels (personal, social, organizational), and the enhancement of the participatory process of planning for future accomplishments. A case study supported by the Municipality of Milano (Italy) is analyzed with the aim to understand the key issues to improve the well-being of the citizens. The paper describes the context of the experience, highlighting the Delphi approach adopted and the ways applied to involve citizens in urban development policies. Discussion and conclusions address the lesson learnt from the case study, pointing out how to prompt and nurture sharing and knowing opportunities and the specific conditions that can support plural stakeholders’ engagement in a sustainable urban future.

Optimal scheduling of isolated microgrid with an electric vehicle battery swapping station in multi-stakeholder scenarios: A bi-level programming approach via real-time pricing

In order to coordinate the scheduling problem between an isolated microgrid (IMG) and electric vehicle battery swapping stations (BSSs) in multi-stakeholder scenarios, a new bi-level optimal scheduling model is proposed for promoting the participation of BSSs in regulating the IMG economic operation. In this model, the upper-level sub-problem is formulated to minimize the IMG net costs, while the lower-level aims to maximize the profits of the BSS under real-time pricing environments determined by demand responses in the upper-level decision. To solve the model, a hybrid algorithm, called JAYA-BBA, is put forward by combining a real/integer-coded JAYA algorithm and the branch and bound algorithm (BBA), in which the JAYA and BBA are respectively employed to address the upper- and lower- level sub-problems, and the bi-level model is eventually solved through alternate iterations between the two levels. The simulation results on a microgrid test system verify the effectiveness and superiority of the presented approach.

Exploring stakeholder interactions through the lens of complexity theory: lessons from the sugar industry

The aim of this study is to identify challenges in multi-stakeholder relationships and to provide recommendations on how to manage complexity within these complex systems. The sugar industry under investigation is composed of diverse stakeholders who pursue various objectives, and complexity arises from these multiple interactions. Complexity theory is used here to analyse stakeholder relationships in a mill area in the sugar industry. The qualitative research approach is used. In-depth, semi-structured interviews are conducted with various stakeholder groups who are able to provide insight into the challenges in the mill area—and how these can be addressed. Thematic analysis is used. An analysis of the interactions reveals that stakeholders face overlapping problems, increasing demands, and an uncertain future. Relationships are characterised by a lack of trust and transparency, and are further strained by organisational structures, control and bureaucracy. The study highlights a dire need for cooperation and for a collectivist culture to achieve a competitive edge. It reveals that stakeholder interaction contributes to systemic awareness, shared strategy and expertise, collective learning, and system-wide goals which in turn impacts positively on performance. Important factors which are found to influence stakeholder interaction include the capacity for change, information, transparency, distributed leadership, flexible organisational structures, and the capacity of stakeholders to contribute. This study provides a significant contribution by presenting conceptual models to better understand multi-stakeholder scenarios.

Toward carrier cloud: Potential, challenges, and solutions

Mobile operators are in need of means to cope with the ever increasing mobile data traffic, introducing minimal additional capital expenditures on existing infrastructures, principally due to the modest average revenue per user. Network virtualization and cloud computing techniques, along with the principles of the latter in terms of service elasticity, on-demand, and payper-use, could be important enablers for various mobile network enhancements and cost reduction. This article discusses the recent trends the mobile telecommunications market is experiencing, showcasing some of the emerging consumer products and services that are facilitating such trends. The article also discusses the challenges these trends present to mobile network operators. It also demonstrates the possibility of extending cloud computing beyond data centers toward the mobile end user, providing end-to-end mobile connectivity as a cloud service. The article introduces a set of technologies and methods for on-demand provision of a decentralized and elastic mobile network as a cloud service over a distributed network of cloud computing data centers. The concept of Follow-Me-Cloud, whereby not only data but also mobile services intelligently follow their respective users, is also introduced. The novel business opportunities behind the envisioned carrier cloud architecture and service are also discussed, considering various multi-stakeholder scenarios.

Participatory scenarios as a tool to link science and policy on food security under climate change in East Africa

How effective are multi-stakeholder scenarios- building processes to bring diverse actors together and create a policy-making tool to support sustainable development and promote food security in the developing world under climate change? The effectiveness of a participatory scenario development process highlights the importance of ''bound- ary work'' that links actors and organizations involved in generating knowledge on the one hand, and practitioners and policymakers who take actions based on that knowledge on the other. This study reports on the application of criteria for effective boundary work to a multi-stakeholder scenarios process in East Africa that brought together a range of regional agriculture and food systems actors. This analysis has enabled us to evaluate the extent to which these scenarios were seen by the different actors as credible, legitimate and salient, and thus more likely to be useful. The analysis has shown gaps and opportunities for improvement on these criteria, such as the quantification of scenarios, attention to translating and communicating the results through various channels and new approaches to enable a more inclusive and diverse group of participants. We conclude that applying boundary work criteria to multi-stakeholder scenarios pro- cesses can do much to increase the likelihood of developing sustainable development and food security policies that are more appropriate.

Interactive simulations for promoting transdisciplinary understanding: a case study of the Western Cape fisheries, South Africa

Simulations have proven beneficial in enabling participants from various backgrounds to meaningfully engage in learning from experience. The aim of this paper is to investigate how interactive simulations can play a role in navigating the changes faced in a multi- stakeholder setting, characterised by users dependent on marine resources and an authorising institution. Relevant literature in the areas of simulation and gaming, change management, systems thinking, and complexity theory was examined. A qualitative research approach and purposive sampling were employed. Interviews were first conducted with diverse stakeholders in the Western Cape fisheries of South Africa to determine the issues. A simulation was thereafter designed. The main findings from this study indicate that simulation use illustrates how the various stakeholders in a system interact, and how their actions and decisions influence each other. The simulation may be used in other areas of natural resource management, as well as in other kinds of multi- stakeholder scenarios.Keywords: Simulation and gaming, Change management, Fisheries, Multi-stakeholder scenarios, Systems thinking, Complexity theoryDisciplines: Conflict Resolution, Leadership Studies, Management Studies, Natural Resource Management

A dissent-based approach for multi-stakeholder scenario development — The future of electric drive vehicles

In this paper, we present a novel approach for generating scenarios in multi-stakeholder environments. In order to address one of the most imperative environmental and societal challenges related to mobility, we explore the future of electric drive vehicles (EDVs). Since many different stakeholders are involved in the socio-technological transition from internal combustion engines (ICEs) to EDVs, we present a dissent-based scenario development process, which uses the Delphi technique for data generation. In total, 140 experts from 15 stakeholder groups participated in this German-based survey and assessed controversial projections for 2030. Results reveal a considerably high degree of dissent. In order to cope with different viewpoints in the scenario development process, we utilize a novel 5-step dissent analysis for further insights into possible futures. Thus, we account for potential differences among stakeholder groups (step 1), the effect of a desirability bias (step 2), as well as the impact of outliers (step 3) and bipolarity (step 4) in the survey results. Finally, we identify different clusters of experts through latent class analysis (step 5). Based on the results of the dissent analysis, seven partially conflicting multi-stakeholder scenarios for the future of EDVs in 2030 are developed.

Dilemmas and challenges in forest conservation and development interventions: Case of Northwest Pakistan

Conservation and development projects are key instruments of international development agencies for natural resource conservation and rural development. However, despite some success stories, conservation of natural resources (particularly forests) in conjunction with socio-economic development – which is the precondition for sustainable development – remained a challenge in most of the developing countries. In Pakistan, too, natural forests in the Northwestern highlands continue to be depleted in spite of numerous interventions, by the international donors, to conserve the remaining forests. This paper uses a sustainable development perspective, and attempts to study the quest by the forest conservation and development interventions – initiated by the overseas development aid – regarding operationalisation of sustainable development as conceived by the projects' implementing agencies and thereby comparing it with local implementation context in terms of perceived impact/usefulness, and participation of stakeholders in the projects. This paper argues that, without considering socio-economic realities at micro (village) level, one cannot envisage the success of conservation and development interventions by considering only structural and meso (national/regional) levels. Forestry should be seen in a multi-stakeholder scenario where various actors have different claims and entitlements over forest resources. Major challenge for international development donors is to ensure a balance of power between stakeholders.