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A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure

We propose a modified eco-efficiency (EE) framework and novel sustainability analysis methodology for green infrastructure (GI) practices used in water resource management. Green infrastructure practices such as rainwater harvesting (RWH), rain gardens, porous pavements, and green roofs are emerging...

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Autores principales: Ghimire, Santosh R, Johnston, John M
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6093199/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28304134
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ieam.1928
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author Ghimire, Santosh R
Johnston, John M
author_facet Ghimire, Santosh R
Johnston, John M
author_sort Ghimire, Santosh R
collection PubMed
description We propose a modified eco-efficiency (EE) framework and novel sustainability analysis methodology for green infrastructure (GI) practices used in water resource management. Green infrastructure practices such as rainwater harvesting (RWH), rain gardens, porous pavements, and green roofs are emerging as viable strategies for climate change adaptation. The modified framework includes 4 economic, 11 environmental, and 3 social indicators. Using 6 indicators from the framework, at least 1 from each dimension of sustainability, we demonstrate the methodology to analyze RWH designs. We use life cycle assessment and life cycle cost assessment to calculate the sustainability indicators of 20 design configurations as Decision Management Objectives (DMOs). Five DMOs emerged as relatively more sustainable along the EE analysis Tradeoff Line, and we used Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), a widely applied statistical approach, to quantify the modified EE measures as DMO sustainability scores. We also addressed the subjectivity and sensitivity analysis requirements of sustainability analysis, and we evaluated the performance of 10 weighting schemes that included classical DEA, equal weights, National Institute of Standards and Technology’s stakeholder panel, Eco-Indicator 99, Sustainable Society Foundation’s Sustainable Society Index, and 5 derived schemes. We improved upon classical DEA by applying the weighting schemes to identify sustainability scores that ranged from 0.18 to 1.0, avoiding the nonuniqueness problem and revealing the least to most sustainable DMOs. Our methodology provides a more comprehensive view of water resource management and is generally applicable to GI and industrial, environmental, and engineered systems to explore the sustainability space of alternative design configurations.
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spelling pubmed-60931992018-08-15 A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure Ghimire, Santosh R Johnston, John M Integr Environ Assess Manag Article We propose a modified eco-efficiency (EE) framework and novel sustainability analysis methodology for green infrastructure (GI) practices used in water resource management. Green infrastructure practices such as rainwater harvesting (RWH), rain gardens, porous pavements, and green roofs are emerging as viable strategies for climate change adaptation. The modified framework includes 4 economic, 11 environmental, and 3 social indicators. Using 6 indicators from the framework, at least 1 from each dimension of sustainability, we demonstrate the methodology to analyze RWH designs. We use life cycle assessment and life cycle cost assessment to calculate the sustainability indicators of 20 design configurations as Decision Management Objectives (DMOs). Five DMOs emerged as relatively more sustainable along the EE analysis Tradeoff Line, and we used Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), a widely applied statistical approach, to quantify the modified EE measures as DMO sustainability scores. We also addressed the subjectivity and sensitivity analysis requirements of sustainability analysis, and we evaluated the performance of 10 weighting schemes that included classical DEA, equal weights, National Institute of Standards and Technology’s stakeholder panel, Eco-Indicator 99, Sustainable Society Foundation’s Sustainable Society Index, and 5 derived schemes. We improved upon classical DEA by applying the weighting schemes to identify sustainability scores that ranged from 0.18 to 1.0, avoiding the nonuniqueness problem and revealing the least to most sustainable DMOs. Our methodology provides a more comprehensive view of water resource management and is generally applicable to GI and industrial, environmental, and engineered systems to explore the sustainability space of alternative design configurations. 2017-04-19 2017-09 /pmc/articles/PMC6093199/ /pubmed/28304134 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ieam.1928 Text en http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Article
Ghimire, Santosh R
Johnston, John M
A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure
title A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure
title_full A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure
title_fullStr A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure
title_full_unstemmed A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure
title_short A Modified Eco-Efficiency Framework and Methodology for Advancing the State of Practice of Sustainability Analysis as Applied to Green Infrastructure
title_sort modified eco-efficiency framework and methodology for advancing the state of practice of sustainability analysis as applied to green infrastructure
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6093199/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28304134
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ieam.1928
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