Managing environmental systems: supporting sustainable urbanization

The document details SEI's efforts to support sustainable urbanization through the development of the Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) tool, greenhouse gas (GHG) emission tracking frameworks, and the promotion of ecological sanitation. It highlights specific projects in cities such as Bangalore, Seattle, and Leeds, while emphasizing the importance of stakeholder engagement and the co-benefits of urban green infrastructure.

• The Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) system is a cornerstone of SEI's work, used by thousands of researchers and planners globally and translated into 21 languages to analyze urban water supply and demand.
• In La Paz and El Alto, Bolivia, SEI developed six climate scenarios to help local policy-makers address water scarcity caused by rapid urban growth and the recession of Andean glaciers.
• SEI's research indicates that the speed of urban development and redevelopment significantly impacts the carbon footprints of residents, and that cost-effective measures for decarbonization are available.
• A study of the Leeds City Region in the UK found that the region could reduce its carbon emissions by 41% by 2022 based on conservative estimates compared to 1990 levels.
• Global sanitation is facing a crisis where 75% of wastewater remains untreated, particularly in fast-growing urban and peri-urban areas of developing countries.
• Urban green infrastructure, such as rain gardens and green walls, provides environmental functions like mitigating heat islands and reducing flooding, as well as health co-benefits such as building resilience to stress and depression.
• SEI mapped the "urban metabolism" of Bangalore, India, creating an open-source geoportal and the first online deployment of the WEAP tool to visualize water resource use.

APA

Stockholm Environment Institute (2014). Managing environmental systems: supporting sustainable urbanization. https://www.sei.org/mediamanager/documents/Publications/SEI-SynthesisBrief-MES-SusUrb.pdf

Chicago

Stockholm Environment Institute. Managing environmental systems: supporting sustainable urbanization. 2014. https://www.sei.org/mediamanager/documents/Publications/SEI-SynthesisBrief-MES-SusUrb.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Stockholm Environment Institute |title=Managing environmental systems: supporting sustainable urbanization |date=2014 |url=https://www.sei.org/mediamanager/documents/Publications/SEI-SynthesisBrief-MES-SusUrb.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{stockholmenvironmentinstitute2014managing, author = {{Stockholm Environment Institute}}, title = {{Managing environmental systems: supporting sustainable urbanization}}, institution = {Stockholm Environment Institute}, year = {2014}, url = {https://www.sei.org/mediamanager/documents/Publications/SEI-SynthesisBrief-MES-SusUrb.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }