FEW Nexus Tool Survey

As a part of the design-research efforts on Moveable Nexus (M-NEX), the Delft University of Technology and University of Michigan teams have initiated ‘a state of the art of practice’ review to assess existing approaches and modelling methods of the FEW Nexus for application in urban design projects. While FEW modelling promises to eliminate siloed thinking, and thereby introduce a more comprehensive system for thinking questions of urban sustainability, many collateral issues facing urban design proposals remain uncaptured by stock and flow modelling approaches. Specifically, with the M-NEX focus on urban agriculture systems within city regions, impacts on health, learning, community building, and social systems reside outside of material and energy flow analysis (MEFA)-based approaches to system modelling emanating from the Environmental Science disciplines.
Currently, there is a pronounced lack of FEW nexus evaluation tools that readily lend themselves for utilization by urban designers and planners in making rapid and comparative assessments of the FEW impacts of design interventions. Although there is a broad spectrum of Nexus assessment, modelling, and distributed simulation (DS) tools, these tools often function on the supra-national scale, have a specific entry point, cover certain bi-directional relationships, are unintelligible to a non-skilled user, or are limited by data availability and standardized measures. To address these specific challenges, the team has assembled a comparative survey of available tools, methods, and frameworks for FEW-Nexus based assessment.
The literature compiled in this section provides a comprehensive overview of existing FEW assessment tools, methodologies, and corresponding application in urban design propositions and policy formulation. Each research project included in the survey has a specific way of referring to the nexus including FEW, FWE, and WEF. These acronyms are used interchangeably in the compilation.

Contact

The Moveable Nexus (M-NEX): Design-led urban food, water, and energy management innovation in new boundary conditions of change, is a design research-based effort delivering FEW system assessment tools and pragmatic design solutions through stakeholder engaged living labs in six bioregions across the world. This co-design research initiative is based on three interdisciplinary knowledge platforms of design, evaluation, and participation. Each platform assembles, structures, and synthesizes existing knowledge, tools, data, methods, models and case studies for FEW nexus applications.
The following tool compilation is part of the evaluation platform and is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF): Award 1832214 and Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this compilation are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the funding organization.

Metrics

The investigation applies scale (global/ regional/ national/ local), access (public/ private), year (2011-2019), intended user (researcher/ planner / policymakers) and publication type (website/ software/ journal article/ report) as metric for cataloguing the survey. All publications in the tool survey have been summarized in the later sections. The literature compiled here follows the timeline 2011-2019, that is after the release of two pivotal publications, Hoff (2011) and World Economic Forum (2011), that brought the concept of FEW-Nexus to global academic attention.
The following table lists projects and papers reviewing FEW tools and methodologies.

Title	Scale	Access	Year	Intended User	Publication Type
The Water-Energy-Food Nexus: A systematic review of methods for nexus assessment	Global	Open	2018	Researchers / Policy Makers	Journal Article
Energy modeling and the Nexus concept	Global	Public	2018	Researchers / Policy Makers	Journal Article
Quantifying the Water-Energy-Food Nexus: Current Status and Trends	Global	Public	2016	Researcher	Journal Article
Water-Energy-Food (WEF) Nexus Tool 2.0: Guiding integrative resource planning and decision making	Regional	Private	2015	Researcher / Planners / Policy Maker	Journal Article , Website
Scaling up Agriculture in City-Regions to mitigate FEW Systems Impact	Global	Public	2016	Researcher / Planners / Urban Designers / Policy Maker	University Publication / White Paper
Complexity versus simplicity in water energy food nexus (WEF) assessment tools	Global	Private	2018	Researcher	Journal Article
Global Climate, Land, Energy & Water Strategies (CLEWS)	Global	Public	2012	Researcher	Journal Article, Website
Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism (MuSIASEM)	Global	Private	2013	Researcher	Book Chapter
Foreseer	National	Private	2012	Researcher	Software, Website
WEAP-LEAP	National, Basin	Public	2013	Researcher	Software, Website
iSDG Planning Model	National	Public	2015	Researcher/ Planner/ Policy Maker	Software, Website
World Bank Climate and Disaster Risk Screening Tools	National	Public	2014	Researcher/ Policy Makers	Website
Walking the Nexus Talk: Assessing the Water-Energy-Food Nexus	Global	Public	2014	Researcher / Policy Maker/ Stakeholder	Report
A review of the water-energy nexus	Global	Private	2015	Researcher	Journal Article
Renewable Energy in the Water, Energy & Food Nexus.	National	Public	2015	Researcher	Report
Review of water-energy-food Nexus tools to improve the Nexus modeling approach for integrated policymaking	Global	Private	2017	Researcher/ Policy Maker	Journal Article
Designing integrated local production systems: A study on the food-energy-water nexus	Local	Private	2016	Researcher/ Urban Designers/ Policy Maker	Journal Article
Understanding water-energy-food and ecosystem interactions using the nexus simulation tool	Local	Private	2017	Researcher/ Urban Designers/ Policy Maker	Journal Article
Water-energy-food nexus: Concepts, questions, and methodologies.	Global	Private	2018	Researcher	Journal Article
Food-energy-water (FEW) nexus for urban sustainability: A comprehensive review	Global	Private	2018	Researcher	Journal Article
Quantifying the Urban Food-Energy-Water Nexus: The Case of the Detroit Metropolitan Area	Regional	Private	2018	Researcher / Policy Maker	Journal Article
Carrying capacity of U.S. agricultural land: Ten diet scenarios	National	Public	2016	Researcher / Policy Maker	Journal Article
Greenhouse Gas Emission in the United States Food System: Current and Healthy scenario	National	Private	2019	Researcher/ Urban Designer/ Policy Maker	Journal Article

Nexus Assessment Tools and Methods

The following section elaborates the compiled literature on tools and methods.

The Water-Energy-Food Nexus: A systematic review of methods for nexus assessment

by Tamee R Albrecht, Arica Crootof, Christopher A Scott
Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy, and School of Geography and Development University of Arizona, United States

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Summary: The paper provides a literature review of WEF nexus methods and approaches in scientific analysis. The study reveals that the repetitive use of a specific research methodology to capture WEF nexus is rare and most analyses are predisposed towards siloed thinking and do not capture the entirety of the nexus. Further, most analyses follow quantitative methods, followed by social science methodologies, and only one-fifth include both quantitative and qualitative approaches. To evaluate analytical tools compiled in the literature, the paper applies four distinct metrics including innovation, context, collaboration, and implementation. The evaluation results with eighteen promising studies on WEF nexus. The paper advocates for stakeholder engagement and interdisciplinary research incorporating social and political assessment of the contexts.

Energy modeling and the Nexus concept

by Floor Brouwer, Georgios Avgerinopoulos, Dora Fazekas, Chrysi Laspidou, Jean-Francois Mercure, Hector Pollitt, Eunice Pereira Ramos, Mark Howells
Wageningen Research, The Hague, The Netherlands; Division of Energy Systems Analysis, Royal Institute of Technology - KTH, Stockholm, Sweden; Cambridge Econometrics, United Kingdom; Civil Engineering Department, University of Thessaly, Greece; Radboud University, Faculty of Science, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

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Summary: The paper provides an overview of modeling tools designed to analyse energy systems within the broader context of food, water, energy, land, and climate nexus. The paper evaluates six energy-based models including E3ME-FTT- “Macroeconomic simulation model”, MAGENT-, CAPRI- “Global agro-economic model”, IMAGE-“comprehensive integrated modelling framework of global environmental change”, OSeMOSYS- “Systems cost-optimisation model”, and MAGPIE-LPjML- “Global land use allocation model, coupled to grid-based dynamic vegetation.” The paper highlights crossovers between models and provide insights into underlined assumptions made for each of the models. The study calls for further analysis into land markets such as impact of renewable energy potential, interdisciplinary research involving food science, engineering, and hydrology, and finally involving stakeholder engagement to bring forth interaction between science and policy.

Quantifying the Water-Energy-Food Nexus: Current Status and Trends

by Yuan Chang, Guijun Li, Yuan Yao, Lixiao Zhang, Chang Yu
School of Management Science and Engineering, Central University of Finance and Economics, Beijing, China; McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA; State Key Joint Laboratory of Environmental Simulation and Pollution Control, School of Environment; Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China; School of Economics and Management, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, China;

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Summary: The paper demonstrates how quantifying WEF nexus linkages reveal synergies and trade-offs across sectors and generates compressive methods of managing and developing the nexus. The study summarizes global estimates of WEF linkages, draws attention to limitations and methodological challenges associated with system calculation, and indicates ways by which robust WEF quantifications can be achieved. The paper reveals how previous studies on two-sector modelling and assessment (water-energy, water-food, and food-energy) have provided the basis for integrated WEF nexus modelling and analysis. However, the present research lacks the comparability of results, with differing “boundaries, definitions, approaches, and methodologies” adopted for WEF nexus quantifications. Lastly, the paper advocates synthesizing of definition, synergistically developing WEF databases, coordinating top-down and bottom-up approaches, and “developing an integrated and flexible analytical framework” of analysis.

Water-Energy-Food (WEF) Nexus Tool 2.0: Guiding integrative resource planning and decision making

by Bassel T. Dahera, Rabi H. Mohtarb
Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, and Zachery Department of Civil Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, United States.
Online tool: http://wefnexustool.org/register.php

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Summary: The paper presents an online nexus modelling and assessment tool to study the overall impact of varying degrees of food production (self-sufficiency index) on the nexus and determine strategic allocation of national resources. The tool quantifies linkages between food, energy, and water systems in a scenario-based format while considering present as well as future implications on the nexus based on population trends, changing economies and policies, and climate change. The tool primarily focuses on the middle eastern bioclimatic region for analysis. The authors apply the tool to the Qatar context and reveal that “land” as a resource is sensitive to the varying degrees of food self-sufficiency in the country. Thus, there is a need for improving the yield of locally produced food, and identifying alternative methods, such as sustainable trade practices, to ensure food security in the country.

Scaling up Agriculture in City-Regions to mitigate FEW Systems Impact

by Glen T. Daigger, Joshua P. Newell, Nancy G. Love, Nathan McClintock, Mary Gardiner, Eugene Mohareb, Megan Horst, Jennifer Blesh, Anu Ramaswami
School of Natural Resources and Environment and Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, United States

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Summary: This white paper was developed in support of the NSF funded workshop FEW Workshop: “Scaling Up” Urban Agriculture to Mitigate Food-Energy-Water-Impacts” held at the University of Michigan in 2015. The paper summarizes findings from the workshop on the topic of urban agriculture through the lens of food supply, food security, water quality and reuse, energy use, biodiversity, ecosystem health, equity and governance. The paper identifies key research questions and opportunities to develop FEW systems that are more “integrated, sustainable, resilient, and equitable” in nature. The paper suggests that the re-localization of agriculture around urban centres can potentially result in a more resource and cost-efficient systems through the recapturing of FEW systems. The paper indicates research gaps in the current investigations including (i) how to incorporate “socio-economic dynamics”; “ecological structure and function”; “complex interaction with the FEW systems”, “temporal, geographic and jurisdictional scales” of resource management; “scenarios, decision support, and collaborative planning”; and “assess indirect or transboundary impacts of up-scaling” (ii) how do we address ecosystem impacts of existing urban agricultural systems within dense urban centres (iii) how to adequately conceptualize quantitative evaluative measurements to assess and compare urban agricultural practices (v) what are the power dynamics within the FEW systems and who are the beneficiaries?

Complexity versus simplicity in water energy food nexus (WEF) assessment tools

by Jennifer Dargin, Bassel T. Daher, Rabi H. Mohtar
Department of Civil Engineering, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, and Water Management and Hydrological Sciences Program, Texas A&M University, College Station, USA; Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences, American University of Beirut, Beirut Lebanon

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Summary: The paper provides a literature review on existing nexus assessment tools and introduces a method of comparing and evaluating the complexity of these tools using eight specific criteria defining the “complexity index.” The criteria include access type, interface type, data granularity, data accessibility, number of data inputs, subject matter expertise, training intensity, and user-defined scenario. The comparative evaluation process identifies trends within the nexus assessment tools and further results with a method for “rapid evaluation of the trade-offs” for choosing different tools. The paper indicates that tools with higher complexity bring forth detailed analysis, requiring granular data and high-skilled user; thus, requiring more institutional support. On the other hand, simpler tools provide a general overview of the nexus requiring a specific skill set and easily accessible datasets. Simple tools, therefore, provide high-level analysis and are more successful in identifying “nexus hotspots”. The literature review conducted in the paper points towards a lack of risk assessment analysis in existing nexus tools. Lastly, the paper indicates a need for more accessible tools that can bring forth stakeholder engagement and facilitate decision making.

Global Climate, Land, Energy & Water Strategies (CLEWS)

by Mark Howells, Sebastian Hermann, Manuel Welsch, Morgan Bazilian, Rebecka Segerström, Thomas Alfstad, Dolf Gielen, Holger Rogner, Guenther Fischer, Harrij van Velthuizen, David Wiberg, Charles Young, R. Alexander Roehrl, Alexander Mueller, Pasquale Steduto and Indoomatee Ramma
Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Sweden and the United Nations Division for Sustainable Development.

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Summary: This online-based tool provides resource assessment in terms of land, energy, and water, applied to various geographical scales including global, regional, national, and urban. The tool assesses linkages within the nexus by identifying hotspots, finding ways of reducing trade-offs, and exploring means of developing synergies. CLEWS integrates individual modules into an overarching framework for analysis.

Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism (MuSIASEM)

Mario Giampietro and Kozo Mayumi
Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca per gli Alimenti e la Nutrizione, Rome, Italy; Tokushima University, Japan

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Summary: The Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism tool is based on “bioeconomics and the flow-fund model.” The tool combines “metabolic patterns of food, water, and energy systems” with socio-economic and ecological parameters and provides analysis based on user-defined scenarios including change in land-use, population, and greenhouse gas emission at regional and national scales.

The water-land-energy nexus: Foreseer

by J. Allwood, D. Ralph, K. Richards, R. Fenner, P. Linden, J. Dennis, C. Gilligan, J. Pyle, G. Kopec, B. Bajželj, E. Curmi, Y. Qin, R. Lupton
Department of Geography, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom

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Summary: The tool generates user-defined scenarios to calculate future demands of land, food, energy, and water resources and the corresponding environmental stresses involved in the process including greenhouse gas emission, and water depletion. Using Sankey diagrams, the tool visuals material flows from resource extraction to final services and consumption. The tool projects future demand for resources based on population growth, and climate change scenarios.

WEAP-LEAP

WEAP: Paul Raskin, Eugene Stakhiv, Ken Strzepek, Zhongping Zhu, Bill Johnson, Evan Hansen, Charlie Heaps, Dmitry Stavisky, Mimi Jenkins, Jack Sieber, Paul Kirshen, Tom Votta, David Purkey, Jimmy Henson, Alyssa Holt McClusky, Eric Kemp-Benedict, Annette Huber-Lee, David Yates, Peter Droogers, Pete Loucks, Jeff Rosenblum, Winston Yu, Chris Swartz, Sylvain Hermon, Kate Emans, Dong-Ryul Lee, David Michaud, Chuck Young, Martha Fernandes, Brian Joyce, Chayanis Krittasudthacheewa, Andre Savitsky, Daene McKinney, Marisa Escobar, Amanda Fencl, Vishal Mehta, Johannes Wolfer, Markus Huber, Abdullah Droubi, Mahmoud Al Sibai, Issam Nouiri, Ali Sahli, Mohamed Jabloun, Alex Bedig, Jean-Christophe Pouget, Francisco Flores, Laura Forni, Anne Hereford, Stephanie Galaitsi, Nick Depsky, Bart Wickel, Manon von Kaenel, Susan Bresney, Doug Chalmers and Jeanne Fernandez. LEAP: Charles Heaps
Stockholm Environment Institute. Somerville, MA, United States

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Summary: The Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) model and the Long-range Energy Alternative Planning / Low Emission Analysis Platform (LEAP) were originally developed as independent scenario-based tools by the Stockholm Environmental Institute. Over time they have been integrated to overcome inherent limitations in each of the models. Using a GIS-based interface WEAP assists in resource planning and policy development. The tool accounts for water demand and supply by considering “water use patterns, equipment efficiencies, re-use strategies, costs, and water allocation schemes” along with “streamflow, groundwater resources, reservoirs, and water transfers.” The tool can be applied to “municipal and agricultural system, a single watershed or complex transboundary river basin system.” The LEAP tool assists in energy policy development and analysis. The tool analysis greenhouse gas emission (GHG) for various sectors and “emissions of local and regional air pollutants, and short-lived climate pollutants.” The integration of the two models allows researchers, planners, and policymakers to thoroughly examine and manage water and energy systems and resources.

iSDG Planning Model

Millennium Institute, Washington D.C. USA and Geneva, Switzerland.

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Summary: The Integrated Sustainable Development Goals model is a policy simulation tool, developed to achieve Sustainable Development Goals at the national level. For each country, the tool provides an overview of the expected outcomes of each of the 17 goals by 2030. Further, by applying user-defined scenarios, the tool measures the potential impacts of proposed policies, identifies specific prioritises and investments needed, aligns SDG requirements with national objectives, and assists in budgeting and scheduling for the implementation of the policy. The model is primarily designed for policymakers, planners, and government officials, to visualize the impacts of current policy decisions.

IRENA’s Preliminary Nexus Assessment Tool

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Summary:

World Bank Climate and Disaster Risk Screening Tools

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Walking the Nexus Talk: Assessing the Water-Energy-Food Nexus

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A review of the water-energy nexus

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Summary:

Renewable Energy in the Water, Energy & Food Nexus

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Summary:

Review of water-energy-food Nexus tools to improve the Nexus modelling approach for integrated policy making

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Summary:

Designing integrated local production systems: A study on the food-energy-water nexus

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Summary:

Understanding water-energy-food and ecosystem interactions using the nexus simulation tool

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Water-energy-food nexus: Concepts, questions and methodologies

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Food-energy-water (FEW) nexus for urban sustainability: A comprehensive review

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Quantifying the Urban Food-Energy-Water Nexus: The Case of the Detroit Metropolitan Area

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Carrying capacity of U.S. agricultural land: Ten diet scenarios

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Greenhouse Gas Emission in the United States Food System: Current and Healthy scenario

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Summary

The following table summarizes the above literature.

Title	Author	Research Location	Funding Acknowledgment	Objective
The Water-Energy-Food Nexus: A systematic review of methods for nexus assessment	Tamee R Albrecht, Arica Crootof, Christopher A Scott	Arizona, USA	Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research, National Science Foundation (Grant No.DEB-101049), the Lloyd’s Register Foundation research), and the Morris K Udall and Stewart L Udall Foundation	Literature review on FEW Nexus methods and approaches
Energy modeling and the Nexus concept	Floor Brouwer, Georgios Avgerinopoulos, Dora Fazekas, Chrysi Laspidou, Jean-Francois Mercure, Hector Pollitt, Eunice Pereira Ramos, Mark Howells	The Hague, NI; Stockholm,SE; Cambridge, UK; Volos, GR; Nijmegen, NI	European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant Agreement NO 689150 SIM4NEXUS)	Evaluating modeling tools based on energy and the nexus
Quantifying the Water-Energy-Food Nexus: Current Status and Trends	Yuan Chang, Guijun Li, Yuan Yao, Lixiao Zhang and Chang Yu	Beijing, CN	National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 71473285) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities	Analysis on quantification of FEW nexus
Water-Energy-Food (WEF) Nexus Tool 2.0: Guiding integrative resource planning and decision making	Bassel T. Dahera, Rabi H. Mohtarb	College Station-TX USA	Qatar National Food Security Programme, Qatar’s Ministry of Environment, Qatar Foundation, Purdue University	Evaluating application and outcomes of WEF Nexus tool for case study site of Qatar.
Scaling up Agriculture in City-Regions to mitigate FEW Systems Impact	Glen T. Daigger, Joshua P. Newell, Nancy G. Love, Nathan McClintock, Mary Gardiner, Eugene Mohareb, Megan Horst, Jennifer Blesh, Anu Ramaswami	Ann Arbor- MI, USA	University of Michigan, National Science Foundation	Analysing outcomes of the workshop, “Scaling Up” Urban Agriculture to Mitigate Food-Energy-Water-Impacts”
Complexity versus simplicity in water energy food nexus (WEF) assessment tools	Jennifer Dargin, Bassel T. Daher, Rabi H. Mohtar	College Station-TX, USA; Beirut, Lebanon	Texas A&M University Water-Energy-Food Nexus Initiative (WEFNI) and National Science Foundation (INFEWS Award No. 1739977)	Literature review on nexus assessment tools.
Global Climate, Land, Energy & Water Strategies (CLEWS)	Mark Howells, Sebastian Hermann, Manuel Welsch, Morgan Bazilian, Rebecka Segerström, Thomas Alfstad, Dolf Gielen, Holger Rogner, Guenther Fischer, Harrij van Velthuizen, David Wiberg, Charles Young, R. Alexander Roehrl, Alexander Mueller, Pasquale Steduto and Indoomatee Ramma	Stockholm, SE	KTH Royal Institute of Technology	Tool assesses policy based on climate, land, energy, and water.
Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism (MuSIASEM)	Mario Giampietro, Kozo Mayumi	Japan	Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca per gli Alimenti e la Nutrizione, Tokushima University	Methods to evaluate socio-ecosystems
Foreseer	J. Allwood, D. Ralph, K. Richards, R. Fenner, P. Linden, J. Dennis, C. Gilligan, J. Pyle, G. Kopec, B. Bajželj, E. Curmi, Y. Qin, R. Lupton	Cambridge, UK	BP's Energy Sustainability Challenge; Department of Geography, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom	The tool calculates future demands of land and FEW resources and its corresponding environmental impact.
WEAP-LEAP	Paul Raskin, Eugene Stakhiv, Ken Strzepek, Zhongping Zhu, Bill Johnson, Evan Hansen, Charlie Heaps, Dmitry Stavisky, Mimi Jenkins, Jack Sieber, Paul Kirshen, Tom Votta, David Purkey, Jimmy Henson, Alyssa Holt McClusky, Eric Kemp-Benedict, Annette Huber-Lee, David Yates, Peter Droogers, Pete Loucks, Jeff Rosenblum, Winston Yu, Chris Swartz, Sylvain Hermon, Kate Emans, Dong-Ryul Lee, David Michaud, Chuck Young, Martha Fernandes, Brian Joyce, Chayanis Krittasudthacheewa, Andre Savitsky, Daene McKinney, Marisa Escobar, Amanda Fencl, Vishal Mehta, Johannes Wolfer, Markus Huber, Abdullah Droubi, Mahmoud Al Sibai, Issam Nouiri, Ali Sahli, Mohamed Jabloun, Alex Bedig, Jean-Christophe Pouget, Francisco Flores, Laura Forni, Anne Hereford, Stephanie Galaitsi, Nick Depsky, Bart Wickel, Manon von Kaenel, Susan Bresney, Doug Chalmers and Jeanne Fernandez, Charlie Heaps	Somerville-MA, USA	Stockholm Environmental Institute, Tellus Institute, Hydrologic Engineering Center of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, California State Water Resources Control Board, California Department of Water Resources, International Water Management Institute, Global Change Research Program of the United States Environmental Protection Agency, CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food, Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Korea Institute of Civil Engineering and Building Technology, Water Research Foundation, World Bank, GLOWA Program of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, EU Global Water Initiative, Arab Center for the Studies of Arid Zones and Dry Lands, German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (via the BGR-ACSAD cooperation project), Inter-American Development Bank, Riverways Program of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Stockholm Environmental Institute	WEAP evaluates water demands and supply while exploring alternative scenarios. LEAP provides energy policy analysis.
iSDG Planning Model	Several authors and collaborators	Washington D.C, USA; Geneva, CH	Millennium Institute	Policy based methodology to achieve Sustainable Development Goals
World Bank Climate and Disaster Risk Screening Tools	Several authors and collaborators. Paper: William Veale, Mark Stirling, Nguyen Canh Thai, Peter Amos, Pham Hong Nga & Tran Kim Chau	New Zealand, Vietnam	World Bank	Climate and disaster toolkit
Walking the Nexus Talk: Assessing the Water-Energy-Food Nexus	Alessandro Flammini, Manas Puri, Lucie Pluschke, Olivier Dubois	Rome, ITL	Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Fund for International Development.	Framework for FEW assessment
A review of the water-energy nexus	Ait Mimoune Hamiche, Amine Boudghene Stambouli, Samir Flazi	Oran, AL	University of Sciences and Technology of Oran	Literature review of FEW Nexus methods and case study evaluation
Renewable Energy in the Water, Energy & Food Nexus.	Rabia Ferroukhi, Divyam Nagpal, Alvaro Lopez-Peña, Troy Hodges, Rabi H. Mohtar, Bassel Daher, Samia Mohtar, Martin Keulertz	Multiple	IRENA, Texas A&M University, Purdue University, Qatar Foundation. Vaibhav Chaturvedi (Council on Energy, Environment and Water, India); Michele Ferenz (EastWest Institute); Olivier Dubois, Alessandro Flammini, Jippe Hoogeveen and Lucie Pluschke (FAO); Katja Albrecht, Detlef Klein, Jan-Christoph Kuntze, Gerhard Rappold, Ulrike von Schlippenbach (GIZ on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development), Karl Moosmann (GIZ), Maria Weitz (GIZ); Jordan Macknick (National Renewable Energy Laboratory); Martin Hiller and Andreas Zahner (REEEP); Jeremy Foster (USAID); Anna Delgado, Diego J. Rodriguez and Antonia Sohns (World Bank); Manisha Gulati (WWF South Africa); Ghislaine Kieffer, Diala Hawila, Salvatore Vinci, Elizabeth Press, Deger Saygin, Linus Mofor, Nicholas Wagner, Henning Wuester, Olivier Lavagne d’Ortigue and Arturo Gianvenuti (IRENA).	Impact of renewable energy on WEF Nexus
Review of water-energy-food Nexus tools to improve the Nexus modeling approach for integrated policymaking	Saeed Kaddoura, Sameh El Khatib	Abu Dhabi, UAE	Masdar Institute of Science and Technology	Review of nexus modeling tools
Designing integrated local production systems: A study on the food-energy-water nexus	Melissa Yuling Leung Pah Hang, Elias Martinez-Hernandez, Matthew Leach, Aidong Yang	Guildford, UK; Oxford, UK	Leverhulme Trust, Overseas Research Scholarship-University of Surrey, University of Oxford	Process systems engineering tool for local production system
Understanding water-energy-food and ecosystem interactions using the nexus simulation tool	Elias Martinez-Hernandez Matthew Leach, Aidong Yang	Bath, UK; Oxford, UK; Guildford, UK; Mexico City, Mexico	Leverhulme Trust, University of Bath, University of Oxford, University of Surrey, Instituto Mexicano del Petróleo, Whitehill and Bordon eco-town.	Software tool for techno-ecological simulation
Water-energy-food nexus: Concepts, questions, and methodologies.	Chi Zhang, Xiaoxian Chena Yu Lia Wei Ding Guangtao Fu	Dalian, CN; Exeter, UK	National Natural Science Foundation of China, Dalian University of Technology, University of Exeter.	Literature review on the methods used in WEF Nexus
Food-energy-water (FEW) nexus for urban sustainability: A comprehensive review	Pengpeng Zhang, Lixiao Zhang, Yuan Chang, Ming Xu, Yan Hao, Sai Liang, Gengyuan Liu, Zhifeng Yang, Can Wang	Beijing CN, Ann Arbor-MI, USA	Beijing Normal University, Central University of Finance and Economics- Beijing, University of Michigan, Tsinghua University, National Natural Science Foundation of China, National Science Foundation, National science and Technology Major Project of the Ministry of Science and Technology of China,State Key Joint Laboratory of Environmental Simulation and Pollution Control.	Literature Review on the current methods applied to different scales of FEW Nexus studies
Quantifying the Urban Food-Energy-Water Nexus: The Case of the Detroit Metropolitan Area	"Sai Liang, Shen Qu, Qiaoting Zhao, Xilin Zhang, Glen T. Daigger, Joshua P. Newell, Shelie A. Miller, Jeremiah X. Johnson, Nancy G. Love, Lixiao Zhang, Zhifeng Yang, and Ming Xu"	Beijing CN, Ann Arbor-MI, USA, Raleigh-NC, USA	Beijing Normal University, Central University of Finance and Economics- Beijing, University of Michigan, Tsinghua University, National Natural Science Foundation of China, National Science Foundation, National science and Technology Major Project of the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, State Key Joint Laboratory of Environmental Simulation and Pollution Control.	Applying Material and Energy Flow Analysis to quantify FEW Nexus in Detroit Metropolitan Area
Carrying capacity of U.S. agricultural land: Ten diet scenarios	Christian J. Peters, Jamie Picardy, Amelia F. Darrouzet-Nardi, Jennifer L. Wilkins, Timothy S. Griffin, Gary W. Fick	Boston-MA, USA; Newton-MA, USA; Meadville-PA, USA; Syracuse- NY, USA; Ithaca-NY, USA	Tufts University, Mount Ida College, Allegheny College, Syracuse University, Cornell University, W.K. Kellogg Foundation	Demonstrates a biophysical simulation model to calculate agricultural land required to sustain ten diet scenarios
Greenhouse Gas Emission in the United States Food System: Current and Healthy scenario	Claudia Hitaj, Sarah Rehkamp, Patrick Canning, Christian J. Peters	Washington DC, USA; Boston-MA, USA	U.S Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service, Tufts University	Integration of a diet based model with a biophysical model of land use for agricultural practices to estimate GHGE

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