This paper reports on a research initiative which brings together a knowledge management environment and a decision support tool, bringing sustainability knowledge management into the applications used in architectural design.
It describes two softwares for analysis and visual interactive display (AVIDs) designed to support expert MCDA users by extending the power of analysis of existing tools to enable the users to quickly make sense of complex multi-user, multi-criteria evaluations, possibly in the stressful and time pressured environment of a decision workshop.
The challenges for the research community lie not only in addressing the technical solutions or addressing human centred issues but it is also in creating the enabling environment of a decision framework, which integrates both the technical and non-technical challenges.
Dobrow et al. defined "context" as all factors within an environment where a decision is made and further distinguished between a modifiable "internal" context within which the decision-making process occurs and a broader, fixed, "external" decision-making context influencing health policy decision outcomes.
Regardless of age, a woman can now walk into a reputable and safe environment to make a decision about her body.
Notably, the proposed model considers minimization of annualized system cost (economy), loss of power supply probability (reliability) and greenhouse gas emission (environment), and enables a decision maker to optimize both the number and the type of PV panel, wind turbine, battery and diesel generator as well as the PV panel installation angle, the wind turbine installation height.
Conversely, Dobrow et al. regard internal context more precisely as the environment in which a policy decision is made (guided by purpose of policy, actors' participation and process of decision-making) and the external context as the environment in which a decision is applied including the wider political, disease-specific and extra-jurisdictional influences on policy implementation [ 8].
First we already observed an advantage for global domain categories using scene categories: there was a speed advantage for distinguishing between natural and man-made environments whereas reaching a decision at more detailed levels (sea, mountain, indoor or outdoor environments) required a longer processing time [41].
Last week, the environment minister, Mark Butler, deferred a decision on whether to allow the dredging of the seabed to enlarge the Abbot Point port, near the Queensland town of Bowen, to allow for the export of more coal.
Environment Minister Yvonne Burford said a decision on the future of the area had yet to be made.
