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Dr. Getachew Assefa
School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada

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Research Keywords & Expertise

0 Industrial Ecology
0 social life cycle assessment
0 Sustainable consumption
0 Life cycle sustainability assessment of energy systems
0 Waste management systems and built environment

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Journal article
Published: 27 July 2021 in Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews
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Previous studies on environmental performance of the oil sands industry in Canada conclude that its carbon footprint must be reduced. Yet, it remains unclear what threshold of carbon emissions intensity that the industry needs to meet to be within Canada's carbon share following Paris Climate Change Agreement. Here, for the first time, a top-down approach based on planetary boundary is used to identify the threshold of carbon emissions intensity that can keep Canadian oil sands industry within the planet's carrying capacities in absolute terms. The approach follows four steps in scaling down the global carbon budget into national level for Canada and industry level translated into emissions intensity threshold. The results reveal that under both 1.5 and 2 °C targets, the share of oil sands industry of Canada's carbon budget has been exhausted under most downscaling approaches: 10 % and 20 % annual reduction scenarios cannot help the industry to stay within their carbon budget under climate-relevant thresholds. Therefore, a carbon-negative industry is required where a reduction of 101.5–120 % of current emissions intensity is needed. Even in few cases where the industry is still within its cumulative carbon budget, an emission intensity reduction of 88–98 % is required. The results demonstrate the need for rapid transition that goes beyond zero-carbon to carbon-negative oil sands industry to be environmentally sustainable especially under the 1.5 °C target of the Paris Climate Change Agreement. This shows the need for new pathways in the sustainable energy industry such as hybrid renewable-oil sands operations and hydrogen from oil sands resources.

ACS Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa; Ian Gates. Carbon intensity threshold for Canadian oil sands industry using planetary boundaries: Is a sustainable carbon-negative industry possible? Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 2021, 151, 111529 .

AMA Style

Marwa Hannouf, Getachew Assefa, Ian Gates. Carbon intensity threshold for Canadian oil sands industry using planetary boundaries: Is a sustainable carbon-negative industry possible? Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews. 2021; 151 ():111529.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa; Ian Gates. 2021. "Carbon intensity threshold for Canadian oil sands industry using planetary boundaries: Is a sustainable carbon-negative industry possible?" Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 151, no. : 111529.

Journal article
Published: 08 September 2020 in Water
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East African riparian countries have debated sharing Nile River water for centuries. To define a reasonable allocation of water to each country, the United Nations’ Watercourse Convention could be a key legal instrument. However, its applicability has been questioned given its overly generalized guidance and non-quantifiable factors. This study identified and evaluated appropriate indicators that best describe reasonable and equitable principles and factors detailed under Article 6 of the convention in order to allocate Nile River water among the states. Potential indicators (n = 75) were defined based on multiple sources that can address conflicting interests specific to this basin context. A questionnaire based on these indicators was developed and distributed to 215 prominent experts from five professional groups on five continents. To analyze the presence of agreements or disagreements within and outside of the basin, as well as differences across expert groups, a k-mean clustering analysis and statistical tests (ANOVA and t-test) were employed. The results imply agreement on 75% of the proposed indicators by all experts across all continents. However, a significant difference in identifying the importance and relevance of many indicators between experts from Egypt and other countries was evident. This study thus demonstrates how the UN watercourse convention principles can be quantified and applied to transboundary water allocation, and ideally lead to informed discourse between basin countries in conflict.

ACS Style

Yared Gari; Paul Block; Getachew Assefa; Muluneh Mekonnen; Seifu Tilahun. Quantifying the United Nations’ Watercourse Convention Indicators to Inform Equitable Transboundary River Sharing: Application to the Nile River Basin. Water 2020, 12, 2499 .

AMA Style

Yared Gari, Paul Block, Getachew Assefa, Muluneh Mekonnen, Seifu Tilahun. Quantifying the United Nations’ Watercourse Convention Indicators to Inform Equitable Transboundary River Sharing: Application to the Nile River Basin. Water. 2020; 12 (9):2499.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Yared Gari; Paul Block; Getachew Assefa; Muluneh Mekonnen; Seifu Tilahun. 2020. "Quantifying the United Nations’ Watercourse Convention Indicators to Inform Equitable Transboundary River Sharing: Application to the Nile River Basin." Water 12, no. 9: 2499.

Book chapter
Published: 27 February 2019 in Sustainable Cities - Authenticity, Ambition and Dream
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The chapter focuses on the full life cycle of material and energy flows and uses in cities. Most of the impacts and opportunities in making cities more sustainable exist in how and what types of materials and energy source are used. The life cycle perspective of materials used in buildings and infrastructure systems is better addressed at the point of planning and design. The energy aspect touches both the efficiency of utilization and the impact intensity of the energy used to power and heat urban spaces and fuel transport systems. The type of sources of upstream supply of materials and energy is thus crucial. The commendable efficiency measures targeting the operation phase of urban systems should be accompanied by a consideration of the embodied impact of materials used and the end-of-life management of the materials following the end of their service life. The chapter ends with recommendations on best practices that potentially leverage on life cycle assessment results. It also covers the merits of employing the social life cycle perspective together with the environmental life cycle and economic life cycle in a life cycle sustainability assessment framework that seeks to define the triple bottom line space of lower unsustainability conditions.

ACS Style

Getachew Assefa. Life Cycle Insights for Creating Sustainable Cities. Sustainable Cities - Authenticity, Ambition and Dream 2019, 1 .

AMA Style

Getachew Assefa. Life Cycle Insights for Creating Sustainable Cities. Sustainable Cities - Authenticity, Ambition and Dream. 2019; ():1.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Getachew Assefa. 2019. "Life Cycle Insights for Creating Sustainable Cities." Sustainable Cities - Authenticity, Ambition and Dream , no. : 1.

Journal article
Published: 24 October 2018 in Sustainability
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One of the main challenges in using life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA) is the difficulty of integrating the interrelationships between the three dimensions (environmental, economic and social dimensions) of LCSA results in decision-making toward proposing sustainability improvements for existing product systems. This paper is addressing this challenge by presenting an LCSA-based decision-analysis framework, which is a systematic and structured framework that appraises the pool of potential actions determined based on LCSA results and evaluates their trade-offs to propose potential sustainability solutions. The framework is composed of two parts: (a) LCSA application; (b) decision-analysis approach. The decision analysis part of the framework is built based on some features from previous decision-making approaches and considering the characteristics of LCSA results. The decision-analysis part of the framework, which is the main focus of this study, is divided into five phases to propose and select some recommendations to improve the sustainability performance of product systems. The framework developed is illustrated using results from a previous LCSA case study. The framework can handle the complexity in understanding the interrelationships between the three dimensions of LCSA results, through a structured way of dividing the process into manageable steps. Further work is still needed to apply this framework to a real case study.

ACS Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa. A Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment-Based Decision-Analysis Framework. Sustainability 2018, 10, 3863 .

AMA Style

Marwa Hannouf, Getachew Assefa. A Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment-Based Decision-Analysis Framework. Sustainability. 2018; 10 (11):3863.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa. 2018. "A Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment-Based Decision-Analysis Framework." Sustainability 10, no. 11: 3863.

Journal article
Published: 14 December 2017 in Sustainability
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Life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA) is a still relatively new technique. One of its main application challenges is interpreting the three dimensions of its results in combined fashion. This paper presents the first attempt at an integrated solution-oriented approach in the LCSA, while simultaneously interpreting the results of the three assessments in a combined fashion toward improving the sustainability performance of product systems. It is based on a case study of high-density polyethylene (HDPE) production in Alberta, Canada. The methodology is characterized by five steps: (1) goal and scope definition; (2) inventory analysis; (3) impact assessment; (4) interpretation where the results of the three tools of LCSA are presented and an integrated analysis of the sustainability results following the strong sustainability model and using the Driver–Pressure–State–Impact–Response (DPSIR) framework, is conducted to propose sustainability improvements for the case study product; (5) discussion and conclusion. The integrated approach developed was able to propose some sustainability improvement proposals along the life cycle of HDPE. Yet, challenges exist in interpreting the interrelationships between the three assessment results. Moving from comparative integrated assessment approach in LCSA to solution-oriented approach still faces challenges. This work highlighted some of the research tasks that need more focus from the LCSA community to demonstrate how LCSA can contribute to sustainable development by improving the sustainability performance of product systems.

ACS Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa. Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment for Sustainability Improvements: A Case Study of High-Density Polyethylene Production in Alberta, Canada. Sustainability 2017, 9, 2332 .

AMA Style

Marwa Hannouf, Getachew Assefa. Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment for Sustainability Improvements: A Case Study of High-Density Polyethylene Production in Alberta, Canada. Sustainability. 2017; 9 (12):2332.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa. 2017. "Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment for Sustainability Improvements: A Case Study of High-Density Polyethylene Production in Alberta, Canada." Sustainability 9, no. 12: 2332.

Journal article
Published: 26 January 2017 in Sustainability
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With the global challenge of climate change, it becomes crucial to understand the factors that can guide carbon intensive companies to comply with environmental regulations through significant reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Using the natural-resource-based view, the argument in this paper is that focusing on sustainability-driven resources by companies is a way to meet environmental compliance and reduce GHG emissions while gaining differential competitive benefits. A specific analysis on Alberta case has discussed large GHG emitters’ environmental compliance mechanisms in the context of their sustainability resources. The aim is examining if large GHG emitters in Alberta related to corporations having sustainability resources are complying with the Specified Gas Emitters Regulation (SGER) reduction requirement through cleaner-production driven internal mechanisms. The paper examines the existence of the sustainability resources in the reporting companies related to large GHG emitters responsible for 86% of total GHG reported by facilities with emissions above the threshold of 100 kilotonnes of GHG per year under SGER in Alberta. Corporations are found not using their sustainability resource potential to achieve internal reductions in GHG emissions throughout their facilities. Thus, some recommendations are presented for Alberta case as well as for environmental regulations in other jurisdictions that can potentially help policy makers improve their climate change regulations and achieve their global targets and enable companies to gain competitive advantage while meeting GHG reduction compliance.

ACS Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa. The Role of Sustainability Resources of Large Greenhouse Gas Emitters: The Case of Corporations in Alberta, Canada. Sustainability 2017, 9, 182 .

AMA Style

Marwa Hannouf, Getachew Assefa. The Role of Sustainability Resources of Large Greenhouse Gas Emitters: The Case of Corporations in Alberta, Canada. Sustainability. 2017; 9 (2):182.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Marwa Hannouf; Getachew Assefa. 2017. "The Role of Sustainability Resources of Large Greenhouse Gas Emitters: The Case of Corporations in Alberta, Canada." Sustainability 9, no. 2: 182.