Current studies on the food-energy-water nexus do not capture effects on human health. This study presents a new methodology for assessing the environmental sustainability in the food-energy-water-health nexus on a life cycle basis. The environmental impacts, estimated through life cycle assessment, are used to determine a total impact on the nexus by assigning each life cycle impact to one of the four nexus aspects. These are then normalised, weighted and aggregated to rank the options for each aspect and determine an overall nexus impact. The outputs of the assessment are visualised in a “nexus quadrilateral” to enable structured and transparent interpretation of results. The methodology is illustrated by considering resource recovery from household food waste within the context of a circular economy. The impact on the nexus of four treatment options is quantified: anaerobic digestion, in-vessel composting, incineration and landfilling. Anaerobic digestion is environmentally the most sustainable option with the lowest overall impact on the nexus. Incineration is the second best option but has a greater impact on the health aspect than landfilling. Landfilling has the greatest influence on the water aspect and the second highest overall impact on the nexus. In-vessel composting is the worst option overall, despite being favoured over incineration and landfilling in circular-economy waste hierarchies. This demonstrates that “circular” does not necessarily mean “environmentally sustainable.” The proposed methodology can be used to guide businesses and policy makers in interpreting a wide range of environmental impacts of products, technologies and human activities within the food-energy-water-health nexus.

关于食物-能量-水的关系的最新研究没有捕获对人类健康的影响。这项研究提出了一种新的方法，以生命周期为基础来评估食品-能源-水-健康关系中的环境可持续性。通过生命周期评估估算的环境影响，通过将每个生命周期影响分配给四个联系方面之一来确定对联系的总体影响。然后将其标准化，加权和汇总以对每个方面的选项进行排名，并确定总体联系影响。评估的输出以“四边形的关系”可视化，从而可以对结果进行结构化和透明的解释。通过在循环经济的背景下考虑从家庭食物垃圾中回收资源来说明该方法。量化了四个处理方案对联系的影响：厌氧消化，容器内堆肥，焚烧和垃圾填埋。厌氧消化在环境上是最可持续的选择，对连结的总体影响最小。焚化是第二好的选择，但对健康的影响要大于填埋。垃圾填埋对水的影响最大，对水域的整体影响次之。尽管在循环经济废物等级结构中优先于焚化和填埋，但船上堆肥是总体上最差的选择。这表明“循环”并不一定意味着“环境可持续”。建议的方法可用于指导企业和政策制定者解释产品对环境的广泛影响，