Event summary:
Modern societies establish socio-economic or industrial metabolisms to supply the need of their inhabitants. In this perspective sustainability can be taken as an overall concept to maintain the socio-economic metabolism in the long run, e.g., sustainable use of resources and energy, impacts of products and processes on climate, climate change impacts on value chains etc.
To monitor actual condition and development of metabolisms with aid of metabolic key indicators, various complementary modeling approaches are required, e.g. continuous and discrete event simulation, material flow analysis, often based on spatial data, life cycle assessment, environmental risk management, environmental management accounting. The approaches demand sophisticated data processing techniques and computer-based information systems, for instance process simulation tools, computer- based environmental accounting systems, geographical information systems, visualization tools, reporting modules, as much as possible integrated into a consistent modeling framework.
