Envision’s Critical Role in Rating Infrastructure Sustainability for Developing Countries

Infrastructures are of great importance as they are essential structures and ecosystem services to the communities. To foster social, economic and environmental efficiency and effectiveness in societies, sustainable development of infrastructures (SDI) must be taken into account from early stages of a project lifecycle to the end of its useful life. Over the last years, several organizations have developed frameworks and rating systems, including general and sector-specific rating systems. Among all, Envision is a novel and holistic rating system that comprehensively assesses sustainability of infrastructures and is applicable to all sizes and categories of projects, such as water, energy, waste, transportation, and information. Developed for the North America, it is very beneficial to assess its applicability for developing countries in other regions. In this paper, we first introduce the Envision rating system. Second, we subjectively discuss the challenges of employing such a system for Iran as a developing country. Finally, we draft a few suggestion to implement the system in real-world case studies for the purpose of Envision localization.