Quantifying sustainability in urban systems

Our world is changing rapidly, making it crucial to determine whether our sustainability efforts are meeting our goals or unintentionally exacerbating the problems. Quantifying the effectiveness of our actions is essential to addressing these challenges. This unit provides you with practical skills for conducting sustainability quantification across various scales — from individuals to companies and nations.

You will learn techniques and approaches for modelling and estimating sustainability indicators. These include process-based environmental modelling, bottom-up and top-down environmental footprint analysis using life-cycle assessment,and environmentally extended input-output analysis, along with multi-criteria decision analysis.

You will apply these techniques to quantify various sustainability metrics such as carbon emissions, water usage, biodiversity loss, profitability, employment and poverty across diverse sectors, including construction, water, energy, transportation, food systems, healthcare, tourism, and others. Additionally, you will explore using artificial intelligence (AI) and digital twins to enhance sustainability quantification processes.