Environmental sustainability, integrated sustainability assessment, environmental footprint analysis, environmental input-output analysis, industrial ecology, circular economy, ecological economics, sustainable consumption and production, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), climate change mitigation, sustainability transformations.
Professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
- since 2020 Professor of sustainability research in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UNSW Sydney, Australia
- 2013-2019 Associate Professor of sustainability research in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UNSW Sydney, Australia
- 2006-2017 Director of the Centre for Sustainability Accounting, York, UK
- 2011-2012 Senior Research Scientist at CSIRO Ecosystem Sciences, Canberra, Australia
- 2002-2010 Senior Research Associate at the Stockholm Environment Institute at the University of York, UK
- 1999-2002 Researcher /consultant at the VDI Technology Centre, Future Technologies Division, Düsseldorf, Germany
- 1996-1999 Research Associate and Principal Investigator at the Centre of Technology Assessment, Stuttgart, Germany
Professional Affiliations and Appointments
- Adjunct Science Leader at CSIRO since 2021
- Lead Author on the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC (2019-2021) and Contributing Author on the Fifth Assessment ReportScientific Program Chair of the 27th International Input-Output Association Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, 1-5 July 2019
- Member of the Australian Department of the Environment Expert Committee on carbon neutral precincts, 2016-17
- Technical Advisor to GHG Protocol for Cities scope 3 accounting development under the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol (World Resources Institute (WRI) and World Business Council on Sustainable Development (WBCSD)) (2016-17)
- Council member of the International Input-Output Association (IIOA) since 2016
- Co-Chair of the EEIO Section of the International Society for Industrial Ecology since 2016
- Scientific Program Committee Chair of the 2nd National IELab Conference 2017, 26-28 November 2017, Stradbroke Island, Queensland, Australia
- Member of the Scientific Program Committee of the 24th, 25th and 26th International Input-Output Conferences in Seoul (Korea, 2016), Atlantic City (USA, 2017) and Juiz de Fora (Brazil, 2018)
- Member of the Scientific Program Committee of the International Conference of the International Society for Industrial Ecology, 25-29 June 17, Chicago, USA
- Member of the Scientific Program Committee of the International High-Performance Built Environment Conference (iHBE 2016) – A Sustainable Built Environment Conference 2016 Series (SBE16), 17-18 November 2016, UNSW Sydney, Australia
- Scientific Program Committee Chair and organiser of the 1st National IELab Conference 2015, 11-12 June 2015, Freshwater, Sydney, Australia
- Member of Australian Bureau of Statistics’ Input-Output User Group since 2012
- Series editor of Springer book on 'Developments in Input-Output Analysis' since 2015
- Editor of book 'Sustainability Practitioner's Guide to Social Analysis and Assessment', 2015
- Editor of the Journal of Economic Structures since 2016
- Adjunct/Honorary Associate Professor in the School of Physics at the University of Sydney, 2011-2020
- Editorial board member of the journal Economic Systems Research (ESR) since 2010
- Guest Editor of the Special Issue 2009 of Economic Systems Research on 'Carbon Footprint and Input-Output Analysis'
- Member of the International Input-Output Association (IIOA) since 2007
- Member of the International Society for Industrial Ecology (ISIE) since 2005
- Member of the Sustainable Engineering Society of Engineers Australia since 2013
- Previous affiliations with CSIRO Ecosystem Sciences, Canberra and the Stockholm Environment Institute at the University of York, UK.
My Grants
- ARC ITTC Transformation of Australia's Biosolids Resource, Project 3B, $269k, 2022-2025
- ACT Government, OCSE, Investigation into Scope 3 Greenhouse Gas Emissions, $72k, 2021-2022
- NTNU, BYMARKA - Environmental footprints of cities, $75k, 2019-2021
- Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Key Index Approach Study, $111k, 2019
- ARC Discovery Project DP190102277, Assessing absolute sustainability of global cities, $380k, 2019-2021
- CRC for Low Carbon Living, Integrated Carbon Metrics (ICM), Lead CI, $670k, 2014-2018
- NeCTAR IE Lab, Industrial Ecology Virtual Laboratory (IELab), Co-CI, $160k, 2012-2015
- CRC for Low Carbon Living, Integrated ETWW demand forecasting and scenario planning for precincts , Co-CI, $117k, 2013-2016
- ARC LIEF project LE160100066 , Enhanced modelling capacity for the Industrial Ecology Virtual Laboratory, Lead CI, $250k, 2016-2018
- ARC Discovery Project DP15, Improving the Environmental Performance of Australian Construction Projects, Co-CI, $76k, 2015-2018
- Water Reuse Research Foundation, Methodology for a Comprehensive Analysis (Triple Bottom Line) of Alternative Water Supply Projects Compared to Direct Potable Reuse, Co-CI, $152k, 2014-2016
My Qualifications
- 1995 PhD, University of Ulm, Germany, Department of Analytical and Environmental Chemistry
- 1990 Diploma (equivalent MSc), University of Ulm, Germany, Department of Analytical and Environmental Chemistry
My Awards
- 2012 Thomson Reuters Citation Award in Economics
- Listed as Highly Cited Researcher by Thomson Reuters and Clarivate Analytics annually since 2015.
My Research Activities
Research interest
My research and teaching as Professor of sustainability research at UNSW Sydney is based on a long-standing experience in integrated sustainability assessment and environmental footprint analysis. My main research question is how to achieve concurrent human and planetary well-being. I develop and apply environmental input-output analysis as part of a holistic concept to life cycle assessment, industrial ecology and sustainable consumption and production research. Recent research interests are related to systems change towards post-growth economies. I lead a national e-research infrastructure project and coordinate a number of research projects related to sustainability.
Research Areas
- Industrial Ecology
- Carbon footprinting
- Environmental footprint analysis
- Life cycle assessment
- Environmental input-output analysis
- Sustainable consumption & production
- Ecological Economics
- Low-carbon economy
- Triple bottom line accounting
- Sustainability metrics
- Integrated sustainability analysis
- Sustainability transformations
Lectures/Courses taught
- Environmental and sustainability frameworks
- Environmental accounting frameworks
- Sustainable Engineering and Industrial Ecology
- Sustainability indicators
- Integrated sustainability assessment
- Environmental footprint analysis
- Life cycle assessment
- Material flow analysis
My Research Supervision
Supervision keywords
Areas of supervision
Environmental sustainability, integrated sustainability assessment, environmental footprint analysis, environmental input-output analysis, industrial ecology, circular economy, ecological economics, sustainable consumption and production, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), sustainability transformations.
Currently supervising
PhD supervision
- Guangwu CHEN, 2017, City-scale carbon footprint accounting and mitigation analysis
- Soo Huey TEH, 2018, Integrated Carbon Metrics and Assessment for the Built Environment
- Bahareh Sara HOWARD, 2019, Modelling the Carbon Budget of the Australian Electricity Sector’s Transition to Renewable Energy
- Man YU, 2020, Hybrid input-output life cycle assessment of Construction Projects in Australia
- Mo LI, 2020, Development and application of integrated sustainability assessment informed by planetary boundaries
- Cameron ALLEN, 2020, Systems analysis and modelling to support implementation of the SDGs
- Kylie GOODWIN, current, Absolute sustainability assessment of global cities
- Jingwen LUO, current, Sustainability Assessment of Biosolids Processing Options Based on Process-based Life Cycle Assessment
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6395-8887