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Our urban systems and their underlying sub-systems are designed to deliver only a narrow set of human-centered services, with little or no accounting or understanding of how actions undercut the resilience of social-ecological-technological systems (SETS). Embracing a SETS resilience perspective creates opportunities for novel approaches to adaptation and transformation in complex environments. We: i) frame urban systems through a perspective shift from control to entanglement, ii) position SETS thinking as novel sensemaking to create repertoires of responses commensurate with environmental complexity (i.e., requisite complexity), and iii) describe modes of SETS sensemaking for urban system structures and functions as basic tenets to build requisite complexity. SETS sensemaking is an undertaking to reflexively bring sustained adaptation, anticipatory futures, loose-fit design, and co-governance into organizational decision-making and to help reimagine institutional structures and processes as entangled SETS.

A vulnerability assessment of California roadways to post-wildfire debris flows is developed. The work examines current and future conditions, considering climate change scenarios and how they affect fire risk and precipitation. Results show how post-fire debris flow risks change from today into the future. A discussion is presented on how to prioritize investments considering the criticality of roadways within the broader network.

A vulnerability assessment of California roadways to post-wildfire debris flows is developed. The work examines current and future conditions, considering climate change scenarios and how they affect fire risk and precipitation. Results show how post-fire debris flow risks change from today into the future. A discussion is presented on how to prioritize investments considering the criticality of roadways within the broader network.

As rates of urbanization and climatic change soar, decision-makers are increasingly challenged to provide innovative solutions that simultaneously address climate change impacts and risks and inclusively ensure quality of life for urban residents. Cities have turned to nature-based solutions to help address these challenges. Nature-based solutions, through the provision of ecosystem services, can yield numerous benefits for people and address multiple challenges simultaneously. Yet, efforts to mainstream nature-based solutions are impaired by the complexity of the interacting social, ecological, and technological dimensions of urban systems. This complexity must be understood and managed to ensure ecosystem-service provisioning is effective, equitable, and resilient. Here, we provide a social-ecological-technological system (SETS) framework that builds on decades of urban ecosystem services research to better understand four core challenges associated with urban nature-based solutions: multi-functionality, systemic valuation, scale mismatch of ecosystem services, and inequity and injustice. The framework illustrates the importance of coordinating natural, technological, and socio-economic systems when designing, planning, and managing urban nature-based solutions to enable optimal social-ecological outcomes.

As rates of urbanization and climatic change soar, decision-makers are increasingly challenged to provide innovative solutions that simultaneously address climate-change impacts and risks and inclusively ensure quality of life for urban residents. Cities have turned to nature-based solutions to help address these challenges. Nature-based solutions, through the provision of ecosystem services, can yield numerous benefits for people and address multiple challenges simultaneously. Yet, efforts to mainstream nature-based solutions are impaired by the complexity of the interacting social, ecological, and technological dimensions of urban systems. This complexity must be understood and managed to ensure ecosystem-service provisioning is effective, equitable, and resilient. Here, we provide a social-ecological-technological system (SETS) framework that builds on decades of urban ecosystem services research to better understand four core challenges associated with urban nature-based solutions: multi-functionality, systemic valuation, scale mismatch of ecosystem services, and inequity and injustice. The framework illustrates the importance of coordinating natural, technological, and socio-economic systems when designing, planning, and managing urban nature-based solutions to enable optimal social-ecological outcomes.

Traditional infrastructure adaptation to extreme weather events (and now climate change) has typically been techno-centric and heavily grounded in robustness—the capacity to prevent or minimize disruptions via a risk-based approach that emphasizes control, armoring, and strengthening (e.g., raising the height of levees). However, climate and nonclimate challenges facing infrastructure are not purely technological. Ecological and social systems also warrant consideration to manage issues of overconfidence, inflexibility, interdependence, and resource utilization—among others. As a result, techno-centric adaptation strategies can result in unwanted tradeoffs, unintended consequences, and underaddressed vulnerabilities. Techno-centric strategies that lock-in today’s infrastructure systems to vulnerable future design, management, and regulatory practices may be particularly problematic by exacerbating these ecological and social issues rather than ameliorating them. Given these challenges, we develop a conceptual model and infrastructure adaptation case studies to argue the following: (1) infrastructure systems are not simply technological and should be understood as complex and interconnected social, ecological, and technological systems (SETSs); (2) infrastructure challenges, like lock-in, stem from SETS interactions that are often overlooked and underappreciated; (3) framing infrastructure with a SETS lens can help identify and prevent maladaptive issues like lock-in; and (4) a SETS lens can also highlight effective infrastructure adaptation strategies that may not traditionally be considered. Ultimately, we find that treating infrastructure as SETS shows promise for increasing the adaptive capacity of infrastructure systems by highlighting how lock-in and vulnerabilities evolve and how multidisciplinary strategies can be deployed to address these challenges by broadening the options for adaptation.

Energy use and emission factors for passenger transportation modes typically ignore the total environmental inventory which includes vehicle non-operational components (e.g., vehicle manufacturing and maintenance), infrastructure components, and fuel production components from design through end-of-life processes. A life-cycle inventory for each mode is necessary to appropriately address and attribute the transportation sector’s energy and emissions impacts to reduction goals instead of allowing tailpipe emissions to act as indicators of total system performance.The contributions of U.S. passenger transportation modes to national energy and emissions inventories account for roughly 20% of U.S. totals, mostly attributed to gasoline consumption. Furthermore, world consumption of primary energy amounted to 490 EJ in 2005 with the U.S. responsible for 110 EJ, or 21% of the total. This means that passenger transportation in the U.S. accounts for roughly 5% of global primary energy consumption annually. With a predominant fossil fuel energy base, the impacts of U.S. passenger transportation have strong implications for global energy consumption, U.S. energy security, and climate change. Furthermore, criteria air pollutant emissions from transportation (passenger and freight) are also significant, accounting for 78% of national CO, 58% of NOX, 36% of VOCs, 9% of PM2.5, 2.6% of PM10, and 4.5% of SO2 emissions. These emissions often occur near population centers and can cause adverse direct human health effects as well as other impacts such as ground-level ozone formation and acid deposition.To appropriately mitigate environmental impacts from transportation, it is necessary for decision makers to consider the life-cycle energy consumption and emissions associated with each mode. A life-cycle energy, greenhouse gas, and criteria air pollutant emissions inventory is created for the passenger transportation modes of automobiles, urban buses, heavy rail transit, light rail tran

Energy use and emission factors for passenger transportation modes typically ignore the total environmental inventory which includes vehicle non-operational components (e.g., vehicle manufacturing and maintenance), infrastructure components, and fuel production components from design through end-of-life processes. A life-cycle inventory for each mode is necessary to appropriately address and attribute the transportation sector’s energy and emissions impacts to reduction goals instead of allowing tailpipe emissions to act as indicators of total system performance.The contributions of U.S. passenger transportation modes to national energy and emissions inventories account for roughly 20% of U.S. totals, mostly attributed to gasoline consumption. Furthermore, world consumption of primary energy amounted to 490 EJ in 2005 with the U.S. responsible for 110 EJ, or 21% of the total. This means that passenger transportation in the U.S. accounts for roughly 5% of global primary energy consumption annually. With a predominant fossil fuel energy base, the impacts of U.S. passenger transportation have strong implications for global energy consumption, U.S. energy security, and climate change. Furthermore, criteria air pollutant emissions from transportation (passenger and freight) are also significant, accounting for 78% of national CO, 58% of NOX, 36% of VOCs, 9% of PM2.5, 2.6% of PM10, and 4.5% of SO2 emissions. These emissions often occur near population centers and can cause adverse direct human health effects as well as other impacts such as ground-level ozone formation and acid deposition.To appropriately mitigate environmental impacts from transportation, it is necessary for decision makers to consider the life-cycle energy consumption and emissions associated with each mode. A life-cycle energy, greenhouse gas, and criteria air pollutant emissions inventory is created for the passenger transportation modes of automobiles, urban buses, heavy rail transit, light rail tran