Sustainability assessment of strategic asset management decisions on municipal water infrastructure systems: Framework and application

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Abstract

Developing socially acceptable, environmentally friendly, and financially viable asset management plans (AMPs) is a major challenge for water and wastewater utilities and calls for a comprehensive Sustainability Assessment (SA). This paper proposes a novel framework that applies System Dynamics and Life Cycle Assessment tools to evaluate the long‐term sustainability of strategic asset management decisions for water and wastewater infrastructure systems. The merit of the proposed framework in dealing with the non‐linearity and dynamic behavior of the socio‐economic systems and its utility for SA of strategic asset management decisions are demonstrated in a case study of a Wastewater Collection (WWC) network system. Furthermore, the significant importance of population growth and urban densification policies in sustainability of AMP are highlighted by comparing four alternative scenarios of (1) 100% urban densification, (2) 0% urban densification, (3) 50% densification, and (4) no population growth in the case study. The results of the case study show that the greenhouse gas emission, operational and capital expenses, and bill burden of WWC and treatment services significantly reduce with urban densification.

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Recent developments in Life Cycle Assessment.

Göran Finnveden, Michael Z Hauschild, Tomas Ekvall … (2009)

Life Cycle Assessment is a tool to assess the environmental impacts and resources used throughout a product's life cycle, i.e., from raw material acquisition, via production and use phases, to waste management. The methodological development in LCA has been strong, and LCA is broadly applied in practice. The aim of this paper is to provide a review of recent developments of LCA methods. The focus is on some areas where there has been an intense methodological development during the last years. We also highlight some of the emerging issues. In relation to the Goal and Scope definition we especially discuss the distinction between attributional and consequential LCA. For the Inventory Analysis, this distinction is relevant when discussing system boundaries, data collection, and allocation. Also highlighted are developments concerning databases and Input-Output and hybrid LCA. In the sections on Life Cycle Impact Assessment we discuss the characteristics of the modelling as well as some recent developments for specific impact categories and weighting. In relation to the Interpretation the focus is on uncertainty analysis. Finally, we discuss recent developments in relation to some of the strengths and weaknesses of LCA.

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Business Dynamics : Systems Thinking and Modeling for a Complex World

John D. Sterman (2000)

Today's leading authority on the subject of this text is the author, MIT Standish Professor of Management and Director of the System Dynamics Group, John D. Sterman. Sterman's objective is to explain, in a true textbook format, what system dynamics is, and how it can be successfully applied to solve business and organizational problems. System dynamics is both a currently utilized approach to organizational problem solving at the professional level, and a field of study in business, engineering, and social and physical sciences.