TY - JOUR
T1 - A metropolitan scale water management analysis of the food-energy-water nexus
AU - Guan, Xin
AU - Mascaro, Giuseppe
AU - Sampson, David
AU - Maciejewski, Ross
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank the Editor and three anonymous reviewers for their comments that helped improve the quality of the paper. This research was supported by the National Science Foundation: Award no. CNS-1639227, INFEWS/T2: Flexible Model Compositions and Visual Representations for Planning and Policy Decisions at the Sub-regional level of the food-energy-water nexus. The data used in this study are available through ADWR10 and the Supporting Information.
Funding Information:
We thank the Editor and three anonymous reviewers for their comments that helped improve the quality of the paper. This research was supported by the National Science Foundation : Award no. CNS-1639227 , INFEWS/T2 : Flexible Model Compositions and Visual Representations for Planning and Policy Decisions at the Sub-regional level of the food-energy-water nexus. The data used in this study are available through ADWR10 and the Supporting Information . Appendix A
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2020/1/20
Y1 - 2020/1/20
N2 - Quantifying the interactions of the food-energy-water (FEW) nexus is crucial to support new policies for the conjunctive management of the three resources. Currently, our understanding of FEW systems in metropolitan regions is limited. Here, we quantify and model FEW interactions in the metropolitan area of Phoenix, Arizona, using the Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) platform. In this region, the FEW nexus has changed over the last thirty years due to a dramatic population growth and a sharp decline of cultivated land. We first thoroughly test the ability of WEAP to simulate water allocation to the municipal, agricultural, industrial, power plant, and Indian sectors against historical (1985–2009) data. We then apply WEAP under possible future (2010–2069) scenarios of water and energy demand and supply, as well as food production. We find that, if the current decreasing trend of agricultural water demand continues in the future, groundwater use will diminish by ~23% and this would likely result in aquifer safe-yield and reduce the energy demand for water. If agricultural activities decrease at a lower rate or a multidecadal drought occurs, additional (from 7% to 33%) water from energy-intensive sources will be needed. This will compromise the ability to reach safe-yield and increase energy demand for water up to 15%. In contrast, increasing the fraction of energy produced by solar power plants will likely guarantee safe-yield and reduce energy demand of 2%. This last solution, based on an expanded renewable portfolio and current trends of municipal and agricultural water demand, is also projected to have the most sustainable impacts on the three resources. Our analytical approach to model FEW interconnectivities quantitatively supports stakeholder engagement and could be transferable to other metropolitan regions.
AB - Quantifying the interactions of the food-energy-water (FEW) nexus is crucial to support new policies for the conjunctive management of the three resources. Currently, our understanding of FEW systems in metropolitan regions is limited. Here, we quantify and model FEW interactions in the metropolitan area of Phoenix, Arizona, using the Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) platform. In this region, the FEW nexus has changed over the last thirty years due to a dramatic population growth and a sharp decline of cultivated land. We first thoroughly test the ability of WEAP to simulate water allocation to the municipal, agricultural, industrial, power plant, and Indian sectors against historical (1985–2009) data. We then apply WEAP under possible future (2010–2069) scenarios of water and energy demand and supply, as well as food production. We find that, if the current decreasing trend of agricultural water demand continues in the future, groundwater use will diminish by ~23% and this would likely result in aquifer safe-yield and reduce the energy demand for water. If agricultural activities decrease at a lower rate or a multidecadal drought occurs, additional (from 7% to 33%) water from energy-intensive sources will be needed. This will compromise the ability to reach safe-yield and increase energy demand for water up to 15%. In contrast, increasing the fraction of energy produced by solar power plants will likely guarantee safe-yield and reduce energy demand of 2%. This last solution, based on an expanded renewable portfolio and current trends of municipal and agricultural water demand, is also projected to have the most sustainable impacts on the three resources. Our analytical approach to model FEW interconnectivities quantitatively supports stakeholder engagement and could be transferable to other metropolitan regions.
KW - Analytical modeling
KW - Food-energy-water (FEW) nexus
KW - Metropolitan region
KW - Sustainable water management
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U2 - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.134478
DO - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.134478
M3 - Article
C2 - 31726406
AN - SCOPUS:85074753330
SN - 0048-9697
VL - 701
JO - Science of the Total Environment
JF - Science of the Total Environment
M1 - 134478
ER -