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Open research questions in Water-Energy-Food Nexus Studies

119 gap statements mined from Water-Energy-Food Nexus Studies papers in our 4.5M-paper local library, which holds 1,271 papers on the topic — drawn mostly from each paper's own stated research gap, future-work, challenge and limitation notes, and its abstract. The ones listed below are a selection still marked open; each names the study that raised it, with a DOI link where the paper has one.

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What the literature leaves open

  • The lack of decision-making frameworks capable of addressing multiple and often conflicting objectives in water and energy sustainability. The need for a structured tool for managing trade-offs in complex sustainability planning contexts.

    Compromise solutions for water and energy sustainability: a VIKOR multi-criteria assessment · 2026 · DOI

  • The study may be limited by its focus on Brazil's national resolution database. The centralized governance approach has limitations in long-term adaptation.

    The evolution of emergency river basin management in Brazil: a focus on water and energy · 2026 · DOI

  • The successful application of PCA and AHP demonstrates their capability to synthesize diverse community and expert perspectives—an approach that can be replicated across other Nigerian and West African cities where empirical data remain limited.

    Deploying a Water-Energy-Food (WEF) Nexus approach to design sustainable solid waste management in Onitsha, Nigeria · 2026 · DOI

  • The lack of integration of crop management strategies to address the issues of declining productivity, fertilizer inefficiencies, and rising energy cum production costs in semi-arid regions. The need to evaluate the interactive effects of irrigation water source, phosphorus fertilizer source, and fertilizer application levels on maize productivity, energy efficiency and economic performance.

    Enhancing Efficiency of Water–Energy–Food Nexus Through Irrigation and Phosphorus Management in Maize Production: A Case Study of Semi-Arid Region · 2026 · DOI

  • Limited coordination among stakeholders. Top-down delivery mechanisms that marginalise community feedback. The lack of effective institutional frameworks governing energy and water provision.

    A Systems Thinking Analysis of Institutional Frameworks Governing the Energy–Water Nexus for Productive Agricultural Activities in Rural Tanzania · 2026 · DOI

  • The lack of effective institutional frameworks governing energy and water provision for irrigation and livestock keeping in rural Tanzania. The limited understanding of the challenges and opportunities for improving the effectiveness of SPVWPS. The need for an integrated institutional framework that combines systems thinking with bottom-up and top-down approaches.

    A Systems Thinking Analysis of Institutional Frameworks Governing the Energy–Water Nexus for Productive Agricultural Activities in Rural Tanzania · 2026 · DOI

  • The study is based on a small sample of 80 farming households. The study area is limited to the Rajshahi district of Bangladesh.

    Exploring the water-energy-food nexus among farming households in northern Bangladesh · 2026 · DOI

  • There is a lack of understanding of the WEF nexus at the farming household level. There is a need to investigate the impact of energy costs on food expenditure.

    Exploring the water-energy-food nexus among farming households in northern Bangladesh · 2026 · DOI

  • The need for a comprehensive evaluation of the AI4Gov tools. The need for a detailed analysis of the use cases and features developed in the context of AI4Gov.

    Specification of UC Scenarios and Planning of Integration and Validation Activities V3 · 2026 · DOI

  • WWT entails additional risks, primarily when treatment processes are insufficient, resulting in water that still carries pathogens or contaminants 38,39, thereby posing health hazards and environmental threats if reused or discharged.

    Future trends of desalination and wastewater treatment accounting for risks of maladaptation · 2026 · DOI

  • Future research can build on the BlueMind project's approach to promote water literacy and global citizenship education. Future research can explore the application of the project's evaluation methodology to other education projects. Future research can investigate the long-term impact of the project on students' awareness and behavior.

    BlueMind - Water Literacy for a Sustainable Future · 2026 · DOI

  • Future research should focus on validating the framework across different crisis scenarios and examining the sensitivity of results to operational and logistical priority changes.

    Logistical challenges and strategies for drinking water supply in times of crisis · 2026 · DOI

  • Limited attention to basin-scale internal heterogeneity. Need for coordinated development among water, energy, and food subsystems.

    Differentiating system performance and coordination in the water–energy–food nexus: evidence from the Xiangjiang river basin, China · 2026 · DOI

  • The need to eliminate the influence of heterogeneous dimensions or varying orders of magnitude. The challenge of selecting appropriate variables for the spatial convergence analysis.

    A spatio-temporal analysis of the water–energy–food–environment nexus in Iran using a spatial econometric approach · 2026 · DOI

  • The lack of understanding of the complex interactions between the water-energy-food-environment domains. The need for a comprehensive assessment index to evaluate the WEFE nexus. The necessity to examine the spatial-temporal patterns and factors affecting the convergence of the WEFE nexus.

    A spatio-temporal analysis of the water–energy–food–environment nexus in Iran using a spatial econometric approach · 2026 · DOI

  • The study identifies the need to integrate responsibility allocation with regional and sectoral comparison, production-layer decomposition, structural path analysis, converter centrality, and joint province-sector priority screening.

    Embodied water-energy responsibility across Yangtze River Economic Belt supply chains · 2026 · DOI

  • Although tele-coupled and nexus-oriented collaborative governance and adaptive management have broad prospects, their construction and implementation still face significant challenges. First, governance fragmentation and institutional barriers pose significant political individual challenges for overcoming the departmentalism of departments and small administrative divisions.

    Half a century of adaptive governance on marginal and degraded lands sustains agriculture-ecology-economy co-benefits in an estuarine delta energy city of China · 2026 · DOI

  • This study aimed to investigate the multifaceted determinants of FOS in ASEAN countries by leveraging a comprehensive set of variables, including supply chain digitalization, government effectiveness, carbon emissions, and cleaner energy transition, over a robust panel spanning the period from 2000 to 2023.

    Carbon emission and food security nexus in the ASEAN region: exploring digitalization, good governance and energy transition dynamics · 2026 · DOI

  • The study was conducted in a specific semi-arid region of central Punjab, Pakistan, which may not be representative of other regions. The experiment was limited to eight treatments under raised bed planting and one control treatment under ridge-furrow sowing.

    Enhancing Efficiency of Water–Energy–Food Nexus Through Irrigation and Phosphorus Management in Maize Production: A Case Study of Semi-Arid Region · 2026 · DOI

  • Raising awareness about water as a critical and limited resource. Promoting global responsibility and sustainable development. Evaluating the impact of education projects on sustainable development and global responsibility.

    BlueMind - Water Literacy for a Sustainable Future · 2026 · DOI

  • One study documents that data centre water footprint is heavily dependent on grid electricity source and hydropower coupling, yet none of the desalination studies (prior studies) incorporate grid-level water intensity or hydropower availability as a constraint or variable in their design or optimization models.

    AI Data-Centre Water Tracker: an open, reproducible referee for data-centre water burden · 2026 · DOI

  • Limited attention has been paid to basin-scale internal heterogeneity and the differentiated mechanisms underlying system performance and coordination. Prior studies have focused on the nexus at the national or global level, with limited consideration of local and regional characteristics.

    Differentiating system performance and coordination in the water–energy–food nexus: evidence from the Xiangjiang river basin, China · 2026 · DOI

  • Study presents a methodological breakthrough by refining the analytical framework: integrating the XGBoost machine learning model with the SHAP interpretation tool overcomes the limitations of traditional linear analysis. This approach captures the complex nonlinear relationships governing marine carbon sink drivers while addressing the “black box” issue of machine learning by quantifying each factor’s contribution.

    China’s marine carbon sink capacity assessment and potential projection: a machine learning approach · 2026 · DOI

  • No study in this set evaluates desalination as a solution to data centre water scarcity specifically.

    AI Data-Centre Water Tracker: an open, reproducible referee for data-centre water burden · 2026 · DOI

  • The results are interpreted as a structural reference-year diagnosis, rather than as estimates of current conditions, temporal trends or future scenarios, - Replacing only the transaction table with a newer benchmark would combine incongruent economic and environmental…

    Embodied water-energy responsibility across Yangtze River Economic Belt supply chains · 2026 · DOI

Most-cited papers in Water-Energy-Food Nexus Studies

Most recent work

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Open questions raised by papers listed on this page include: (1) The lack of decision-making frameworks capable of addressing multiple and often conflicting objectives in water and energy sustainability (“Compromise solutions for water and energy sustainability: a VIKOR…”, 2026); (2) The lack of integration of crop management strategies to address the issues of declining productivity, fertilizer inefficiencies, and rising energy cum production costs in semi-arid regions (“Enhancing Efficiency of Water–Energy–Food Nexus Through Irrigation and…”, 2026); (3) The lack of effective institutional frameworks governing energy and water provision (“A Systems Thinking Analysis of Institutional Frameworks Governing the…”, 2026); (4) There is a lack of understanding of the WEF nexus at the farming household level (“Exploring the water-energy-food nexus among farming households in northern…”, 2026); (5) Future research can build on the BlueMind project's approach to promote water literacy and global citizenship education (“BlueMind - Water Literacy for a Sustainable Future”, 2026). 119 gap statements have been mined from Water-Energy-Food Nexus Studies papers in our 4.5M-paper local library, which holds 1,271 papers on the topic; the gaps come from whichever of those papers state one. They are mostly the research gaps the authors state and the papers' abstracts, plus future-work, limitations and challenges passages. The ones listed below are a selection still marked open; each names the study that raised it, with a DOI link where the paper has one, so you can read the original claim in context.

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