Dear colleagues:

Nature-based solutions (NbS) are “living solutions inspired by, continuously supported by and using nature, which are designed to address various societal challenges in a resource-efficient and adaptable manner and to provide simultaneous economic, social, and environmental benefits” (European Commission, 2015). One societal challenge is water security: sufficient quality, quantity, and acceptable level of water-related risk to support human and ecosystem needs. NbS for water are highly relevant for both society and nature—for example, four billion people face severe water scarcity, 1.32 trillion USD is needed annually for water infrastructure just to maintain business as usual, and reductions in environmental flows and water quality are dramatically impacting freshwater biodiversity. The term NbS is most often used as a transdisciplinary umbrella that encompasses existing concepts such as “ecological engineering” and “blue-green infrastructure” in engineering, “natural capital” and “ecosystem services” in economics, “ecosystem-based principles”, “ecological intensification” in agriculture, “landscape functions” in environmental planning, and the family of other nature-based approaches, such as “ecohydrology”, “ecosystem-based adaptation”, “ecosystem-based mitigation”, “eco-disaster risk reduction”, and “natural climate solutions”. Nevertheless, technology and engineering with and for nature remain a minor topic in academic discourse, despite their importance in sustainability transitions. In this Special Issue, we gather analyses, frameworks, viewpoints, and experimental evidence in the use of NbS or techno-ecological NbS (NbS augmented by technology) for improving water security.

One overarching societal paradigm of the last 100 years has been “How much technology can we put in nature?” Nontheless, unprecedented ecological degradation, at the same time as four billion facing severe water scarcity, has forced us to reconsider. Instead, we are now beginning to ask ourselves: “How much nature can we put into technology?”

Nature-based solutions (NbS) offer one pathway. In this Special Issue, we gather analyses, frameworks, viewpoints, and experimental evidence in the use of NbS or techno-ecological NbS (NbS augmented by technology) for improving water security. Key questions to explore include:

1. Evidence for (or against) the contribution of NbS to water quality, quantity, water-related risk;
2. Holistic perspectives on how NbS and fits into the water–energy–food–waste sustainability nexus;
3. Evidence for techno-ecological NbS at any scale (from laboratory to field);
4. Critical reviews of NbS as policy or engineering tools;
5. Any other issue that is pressing and relevant to the topic.

Humankind, indeed all life on Earth, depends on new ways of thinking about our relationship to water. We hope that bringing this knowledge together will advance the scientific and policy discussion in this nascent field. Please reply with your interests if you would like to contribute to this issue.

Prof. Dr. Kristian L. Dubrawski
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• water security
• water quality
• nature-based solutions
• sustainability science
• technology and society
• sustainable engineering