Sustainable Urban Planning

120 Practice

For indicative purposes relative to the sustainability ideal
the overall ‘socio-ecological-economic’ effects of change
in the dynamics of an enterprise or project can be indi-
cated as an alternative to reward-for-failure styles of man-
agement. For clarity and simplicity these are presented as
four factors for overall Production Gain [PG] namely the
accumulated sum [S] of: Economy Equity Environment
and Efficiency.a
Consider the problem of maintaining consistency with
the socio-economic-environmental benefit and loss
outcomes for a public supply (e.g.electricity utility) by
identifying termly (usually annual) rewards and penalties
connected to the output of overall Productive Gain. This
could be categorized, positively-negatively, for the previ-
ously identified: Economy Equity Environment sectors,
and in terms of Efficiency.
The rewards to management for ‘getting it right’ and
penalties for ‘getting it wrong’ hinge upon an interplay.

• The concept of an Economyreward-or-penalty around
  which the level of fiscal profit ‘this year’ would be
  assessed relative to the past. By increasing gross
  income – in all probability the current reward scenario
  
  
  • management would continue to lose or gain bonus
    points in the time-honoured manner.
    •AnEquityfactor would reward continuity-of-supply
    and evenness-of-price. Every supply hitch and price
    hike would incur a penalty, inducing constancy toward
    end-users.
    •AnEnvironmentalpenalty factor would be factored in
    for punishing irregular and/or low levels of delivery,
  
  
  
  

and for creating adverse socio-environmental situa-

tions – sheeted home to the assembly, delivery and

retail sectors.

•AnEfficiencybonus would accrue from improving

consumer savings, achieving end-user economies, and

for increasing worker output.

These four bonus/penalty entities would ‘accumulate’ in

a mathematical sense – incorporating ‘subtractive’ penal-

ties for ‘getting some of it wrong’, along with ‘bonus’

rewards for ‘getting the rest of it right’. In this way, regard-

less of freak weather patterns, natural calamities and

market vagaries, the all-up Production Gain can be

expressed by a simple formula:

Complex generation-delivery-retail-consumer-discard

systems warrant a reward and penalty auditing arrange-

ment – with the devil in the detail. This cannot be solely

industry-regulated, indicating the need for an independ-

ent regulatory authority.

aTwo other ‘E’ components which could be factored-

in are ‘engineering’ (design), and sequestered ‘energy’. For

further reading: consult Edwards-Jones and Hussain,

Ecological Economics, 2000.

Refer also to Kicking the energy habit [box 3.6], Risk

Impact Assessment [box 4.5], and Soft pathways [box

3.4].

PG = Economy f f ... , Equity f f ... ,

Environment f f ... , Efficiency f f ...

1 2 12 13

24 25 36 37

()+ ()+

()+ ()+

Â

Box 4.1 Socio-ecological economics

development policy formulations and plan preparations in macro growth pattern

contexts. The complication is not always one of ‘will’ – the intention to establish

growth pattern performance and to innovate to that end can usually be identified

• the universal difficulty is one of establishing an understanding of and a locking
  onto multiplier processes which achieve conservation with development in a con-
  comitant way. Attention now moves, with only a smattering of formulae, to an
  elaboration and expression of these principles.

Multiplier Principles

The objective for growth management in non-metropolitan regions is the attain-

ment of improved regional and hence national wellbeing via the planned pursuit

of multiplier positive-sum benefits. With the multiplier-within-sustainability