A Framework for Development and Communication of Absolute Environmental Sustainability Assessment Methods

Abstract

An absolute environmental sustainability assessment (AESA) addresses whether a production or consumption activity can be considered environmentally sustainable in an absolute sense. This involves a comparison of its environmental pressure to its allocated environmental carrying capacity. AESA methods have been developed in multiple academic fields, each using their own set of concepts and terms with little communication across the fields. A recent growing interest in using AESA methods for decision support calls for a better common understanding of the constituents of an AESA method and how it can be communicated to scientific peers and to potential users.With this aim, we develop a framework for AESA methods, composed of a succession of four assessment steps and involving six methodological choices that must be made by the method developer or the user. We then use the framework to analyze and compare five selected AESA methods that focus on the release of phosphorus and nitrogen to the environment. In this manner, we show that the framework is able to systematically differentiate AESA methods that initially appear to be similar. Intended users of the framework include (1) method developers communicating new AESA methods to academic peers or potential method users and (2) researchers comparing a group of existing AESA methods and communicating their differences to their peers and to potential users looking for guidance on method selection. Keywords:carrying capacity context-based sustainability nitrogen emission phosphorus emission planetary boundaries science-based targets

Science-Based Targets: On Target?

“…With the mainstreaming of corporate climate disclosure and target setting, there has been an associated shift towards evaluating the quality and effectiveness of these commitments [8]. These criticisms have prompted a recent move towards context-based approaches to corporate sustainability [6] with the use of absolute environmental sustainability assessment methods [9] and resilience-based targets [10,11]. Such approaches link corporate targets with wider ecological system limits, such as planetary boundaries [12].…”

An assessment of the water use associated with Australian diets using a planetary boundary framework

“…However, it does not address the question of absolute limits of resource use and emissions to the environment. In this regard, planetary boundaries have emerged as an important analytical framework for evaluating absolute environmental sustainability (32)(33)(34) , especially across the global food system (35)(36)(37) . That said, for the freshwater planetary boundary, there is considerable uncertainty regarding its definition (Table 1).…”

Ecological resource availability: a method to estimate resource budgets for a sustainable economy

“…The allocation principle has an important influence on the results (Bjørn et al , 2018; Ryberg et al , 2018a; Sabag-Munoz & Gladek, 2017). To illustrate the ERA method, a grandfathering allocation approach (Sabag-Munoz & Gladek, 2017) is applied in this case study, where each resource receives a SoSOS equal to its historic impact share.…”

“…To facilitate this, the method described in this paper translates global environmental limits, expressed as ecosystem parameters, into annual resource budgets, expressed in units of mass, which we define here as ecological resource availability (ERA). In contrast to existing absolute sustainability assessment tools that focus on comparing societal activities to absolute benchmarks (e.g., Bjørn et al , 2016, 2018; Doka, 2016; Fang et al , 2015; Meyer & Newman, 2018; Ryberg et al , 2018b; Sandin et al , 2015), our method aims to explore the magnitude of sustainable resource consumption. It is a modelling tool for testing the effects of technological and societal options on the sustainable resource base.…”