The environment represents the whole ecosystem that a society depends upon for various ecological services. The challenge of sustainability is requiring a new, more complex, approach to environmental management
See our media center where we explore the rise of sustainability and the challenges it will present in the coming decades
View our selection of papers on socioecological systems from water, to food, to energy systems management
Watch our short explainer videos to find out about our complexity approach to environmental management in the age of the Anthropocene
Energy is truly the lifeblood of our economies, a critical infrastructure that affects all of our lives in virtually every activity. Throughout history one thing that has remained common for all economies is that economic development needs energy. How we access, transfer and transform this energy into the useful work of heating, lighting and motion forms what we call an energy system, a set of interrelated elements from the capturing of natural resources to processing and refining to transportation and distribution to consumption. But energy is not simply about technology it is multi-dimensional, involving natural resources, technology processes, economic and social institutions all of these variables interact to give us the out come to the energy system.
Short video giving an overview to our food systems solutions paper. The global food system of today is truly complex in nature, crossing almost all areas from climate, water and energy, to finance and commodity markets, to politics and culture, all are interconnected through our global food system. Today's food and agribusiness forms a $5 trillion global industry, a complex system spanning from the small self-sufficient farmer in rural India, to multinational corporations trading commodities on international markets.
Water, being deeply interconnected with almost all aspects of economic development, is both one of the greatest opportunities and probably the greatest threat to global economic development in the 21st Century. In this video we give an overview to our water systems solution framework, outlining the nature of the water crisis and a new approach called integrated water management.
Part two in our series "Age of Transition" this video explores the rise of the concept of sustainability as it has gone from the fringes to the mainstream within just a few short decades, driven by an environmental crisis on a global scale
Short video giving an overview to our circular economy solutions for businesses in the basic materials sector including mining, forestry, chemicals, and commodities
A short video giving an overview to our environmental analysis paper. The environment represents the whole ecosystem that a society depends upon for various services: such as water, materials, food and energy. In our analysis of the environment we are really looking at a combination of natural ecosystem and human economy, what is called a socio-ecological system, which is a model that helps to focus our attention explicitly, on the interaction between our engineered environment, and the natural environment, and how the two function, or fail to function, as an entire system.
