Richard Rushforth

The vulnerability and resilience of a city's water footprint: The case of Flagstaff, Arizona, USA

Research has yet to operationalize water footprint information for urban water policy and planning to reduce vulnerability and increase resilience to water scarcity. Using a county-level database of the U.S. hydro-economy, NWED, we spatially mapped and analyzed the Water Footprint of Flagstaff, Arizona, a small city. Virtual water inflow and outflow networks were developed using the flow of commodities into and out of the city. The power law distribution of virtual water trade volume between Flagstaff and its county trading partners broke at a spatial distance of roughly 2000 km. Most large trading partners are within this geographical distance, and this distance is an objective definition for Flagstaffs zone of indirect hydro-economic influence—that is, its water resource hinterland. Metrics were developed to measure Flagstaffs reliance on virtual water resources, versus direct use of local physical water resources. Flagstaffs reliance on external water supplies via virtual water trade increases both its hydro-economic resilience and vulnerability to water scarcity. These methods empower city managers to operationalize the citys Water Footprint information to reduce vulnerability, increase resilience, and optimally balance the allocation of local physical water supplies with the outsourcing of some water uses via the virtual water supply chain.

Ideal and reality of multi-stakeholder collaboration on sustainability problems: a case study on a large-scale industrial contamination in Phoenix, Arizona

Multi-stakeholder collaboration among industry, government, the public, and researchers is widely acknowledged as a critical success factor for resolving sustainability problems. Proponents argue that pooling capacities and resources is necessary to cope with such wicked problems. Despite good intentions and attempts to follow best practices, the reality of multi-stakeholder collaboration is often flawed. We demonstrate this mismatch between the ideal and reality with a case study of a multi-stakeholder collaboration centered on a large urban area affected by industrial contamination (superfund site) in Phoenix, Arizona. The study indicates deficits in the collaborative process due to the lack of trust, power asymmetry, and other factors. Efforts have recently been undertaken to enhance the multi-stakeholder collaboration through novel engagement approaches. The study uses insights from stakeholder engagement approaches to demonstrate how the quality of multi-stakeholder collaboration on sustainability problems could be appraised and how common obstacles to such collaboration could be overcome, while reflecting on the role of transdisciplinary research in this process.

The U.S. food–energy–water system: A blueprint to fill the mesoscale gap for science and decision-making

Food, energy, and water (FEW) are interdependent and must be examined as a coupled natural–human system. This perspective essay defines FEW systems and outlines key findings about them as a blueprint for future models to satisfy six key objectives. The first three focus on linking the FEW production and consumption to impacts on Earth cycles in a spatially specific manner in order to diagnose problems and identify potential solutions. The second three focus on describing the evolution of FEW systems to identify risks, thus empowering the FEW actors to better achieve the goals of resilience and sustainability. Four key findings about the FEW systems that guide future model development are (1) that they engage ecological, carbon, water, and nutrient cycles most powerfully among all human systems; (2) that they operate primarily at a mesoscale best captured by counties, districts, and cities; (3) that cities are hubs within the FEW system; and (4) that the FEW system forms a complex network.