A quantitative engineering study of ecosystem robustness using thermodynamic power cycles as case studies

Abstract

Human networks and engineered systems are traditionally designed to maximize efficiency. Ecosystems on the other hand, achieve long-term robustness and sustainability by maintaining a unique balance between pathway efficiency and redundancy, measured in terms of the number of flow pathways available for a given unit of flow at any node in the network. Translating this flow-based ecosystem robustness into an engineering context supports the creation of new robust and sustainable design guidelines for engineered systems. Thermodynamic cycles provide good examples of human systems where simple and clearly defined modifications can be made to increase efficiency. Twenty-three variations on the Brayton and Rankine cycles are used to understand the relationship between design decisions that maximize a system’s efficient use of energy (measured by thermodynamic first law efficiency) and ecological measures of robustness and structural efficiency. The results reveal that thermodynamic efficiency and ecological pathway efficiency do not always correlate and that while on average modifications to increase energy efficiency reduce the robustness of the system, the engineering understanding of ecological network design presented here can enable decisions that are able to increase both energy efficiency and robustness.

Quantifying a virtual water metabolic network of the Metropolitan District of Quito, Ecuador using ecological network methods

“…Their analysis, from ENA metrics has shed light on virtual water interactions in the global agriculture and livestock trading system (Yang et al, 2012). The study by Fang and Chen (2015) has shown that the VWMN of the Heihe river basin is highly redundant, counterintuitively that human-designed networks should be more efficient (Goerner et al, 2009;Kharrazi et al, 2013;Panyam & Layton, 2019;Ulanowicz et al, 2009). Zhang et al (2019) compare the VWMN of Guangdong with the consumption of water resources per unit of GDP, to find the sectors with the least connection to the network.…”

“…The application of ENA metrics to assess ecosystems, along with ecosystem characteristic values, on urban metabolism analysis will provide unique design information for urban metabolic processes to mimic nature's sustainability (Panyam & Layton, 2019). One property that has been observed is that ecosystems present a balanced configuration between resource efficiency and functional redundancy (Fath, 2015; Ulanowicz, 1986), which is believed to lead to robust and sustainable outcomes.…”