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This paper presents a holistic approach to sustainable urban brownfield redevelopment where specific focus is put on the integration of a multitude of subsurface qualities in the early phases of the urban redevelopment process, i.e. in the initiative and plan phases. Achieving sustainability in brownfield redevelopment projects may be constrained by a failure of engagement between two key expert constituencies: urban planners/designers and subsurface engineers, leading to missed opportunities and unintended outcomes in the plan realisation phase. A more integrated approach delivers greater benefits. Three case studies in the Netherlands, Belgium and Sweden were used to test different sustainability assessment instruments in terms of the possibility for knowledge exchange between the subsurface and the surface sectors and in terms of cooperative learning among experts and stakeholders. Based on the lessons learned from the case studies, a generic decision process framework is suggested that supports holistic decision making. The suggested framework focuses on stakeholder involvement, communication, knowledge exchange and learning and provides an inventory of instruments that can support these processes.

Idle brownfields in urban settings are potential resources that could be put to productive use, meeting the goals of urban intensification, helping to curb urban sprawl on the periphery and benefiting communities living around sites. Various decision support tools exist in order to evaluate redevelopment scenarios. Spatial decision support systems have recently been developed to aid in evaluating the implications of the physical attributes of redevelopment scenarios, with a limited focus on the proximity of essential amenities to the local community. The application of proximity analysis in this context supports stakeholders in determining which social amenities are furthest from the local community and the extent to which including such amenities on-site would benefit the local community. A geographic information system based proximity analysis approach is presented specifically for this purpose. The distribution of walking distances for local households is compared to scenarios in which specific social amenities are included on-site. The approach is demonstrated using an abandoned brownfield case study in the Flemish region of Belgium. The local community would benefit most from having a doctor and pharmacy on-site in terms reduced walking distance. The inclusion of other amenities on-site such as employment, schools, green space, meeting places and shops also shortens walking distances for the local community but to a limited extent in comparison to a doctor and a pharmacy. 'Walking distance' is an indicator that is easily understood by stakeholders and the approach lays the foundation for more detailed analyses that would include frequency of visits.

Innovation in photovoltaics (PV) is mostly driven by the cost per kilowatt ratio, making it easy to overlook environmental impacts of technological enhancements during early research and development stages. As PV technology developers introduce novel materials and manufacturing methods, the well‐studied environmental profile of conventional silicon‐based PV may change considerably. Herein, existing trends and hotspots across different types of emerging PV technologies are investigated through a systematic review and meta‐analysis of life‐cycle assessments (LCAs). To incorporate as many data points as possible, a comprehensive harmonization procedure is applied, producing over 600 impact data points for organic, perovskite (PK), dye‐sensitized, tandem, silicon, and other thin‐film cells. How the panel and balance of system components affect environmental footprints in comparable installations is also investigated and discussed. Despite the large uncertainties and variabilities in the underlying LCA data and models, the harmonized results show clear positive trends across the sector. Seven potential hotspots are identified for specific PV technologies and impact categories. The analysis offers a high‐level guidance for technology developers to avoid introducing undesired environmental trade‐offs as they advance to make PV more competitive in the energy markets.

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This publication is made publicly available in the institutional repository of Wageningen University and Research, under the terms of article 25fa of the Dutch Copyright Act, also known as the Amendment Taverne. This has been done with explicit consent by the author.Article 25fa states that the author of a short scientific work funded either wholly or partially by Dutch public funds is entitled to make that work publicly available for no consideration following a reasonable period of time after the work was first published, provided that clear reference is made to the source of the first publication of the work.This publication is distributed under The Association of Universities in the Netherlands (VSNU) 'Article 25fa implementation' project. In this project research outputs of researchers employed by Dutch Universities that comply with the legal requirements of Article 25fa of the Dutch Copyright Act are distributed online and free of cost or other barriers in institutional repositories. Research outputs are distributed six months after their first online publication in the original published version and with proper attribution to the source of the original publication.