PNNL

Abstract

Water, energy, and food are all essential components of human societies. Collectively, their respective resource systems are interconnected in what is called the nexus. There is growing consensus that a holistic understanding of the interdependencies and trade-offs between these and other related systems is critical for solving world challenges across them. While nexus research has grown exponentially since 2011, there is no unified, overarching approach, and implementation of concepts remains hampered by lack of clear case studies. Here, we summarize the results of a collaborative thought exercise involving 77 scientists into 10 key recommendations covering the most critical nexus issues today, emerging themes and where future efforts should be heading. We conclude that a nexus community of practice to promote open communication among researchers, maintain and share standardized datasets, and develop applied case studies will facilitate transparent model comparisons and encourage adoption of nexus approaches in practice.