An examination of Water-Energy-Food nexus: From theory to application

The significance of adopting a nexus approach in gauging the sustainable development of the water-energy-food nexus is usually overlooked since global governance legislations and policies have often focused on a silo-growth agenda of each sector independently. While theoretical sustainability frameworks provide a conceptual vision of the yardsticks that will monitor and assess the achievement of sustainability goals, they have not been used to examine and establish tangible mechanisms for translating sustainability visions into action plans. Against this background, a review of sustainability assessment frameworks and assessment of the socio-environmental system levers of the water-energy-food nexus in the United Arab Emirates is first conducted, following which Masdar City in the United Arab Emirates is used to exemplify the application and translation of sustainability frameworks into practice. The study also presents a new perspective on the convolutions of the water-energy-food nexus by examining time-horizon and planetary factors to address prevailing challenges in the water-energy-food trilemmas. Inspired by the United Arab Emirates’ relentless efforts in driving the sustainability journey toward net-zero and building a balanced circular economy, a sustainability framework of key nexus projects is therefore sculpted to highlight the important role of adaptive management governance in managing socio-environmental systems such as water-energy-food. The Masdar case study demonstrated the importance of sustainability assessment framework as a tool to systematically and robustly monitor the interactions between the nexus components as it can highlight areas of vulnerability, resilience and other states of system characteristics.