Use Envision – Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure

Envision is Delivering Results

The Envision sustainability framework and rating system was designed to help infrastructure stakeholders implement more sustainable, resilient, and equitable projects.

Infrastructure owners, design teams, constructors, and operators; regulators and policymakers; and civil society organizations and community stakeholders can all benefit from using Envision.

Resources in PDF format: Envision Brochure (2-pgs) | Envision Packet (14 pgs) ︎ | Envision by the Numbers ︎

Envision:

Sets the standard for what constitutes sustainable, resilient, and equitable infrastructure.
Incentivizes higher performance goals beyond minimum requirements.
Gives recognition to projects that make significant contributions to sustainability, resiliency, and equity.
Provides a common language for collaboration and clear communication, both internally with project teams and externally with the community at large.

Envision can and should be used throughout the entire life cycle of a project. However, the earlier Envision is applied the greater the value it can deliver.

Envision usage can benefit communities, projects, and people in numerous ways:

Long-term viability through increased resiliency and preparedness.
Lower costs through management and stakeholder collaboration.
Reduced negative impacts on the community and the environment.
Potential to save owners money over time through efficiency.
Credibility of a third-party rating system.
Increased public confidence and involvement in decision-making.

Envision includes 64 sustainability and resilience indicators, called ‘credits’, organized around five categories: Qualify of Life, Leadership, Resource Allocation, Natural World and Climate & Resilience. The categories together address areas of human well-being, mobility, community development, collaboration, planning, economy, materials, energy, water, siting, conservation, ecology, emissions, and resilience. These indicators collectively become the foundation of what constitutes sustainability in infrastructure. Click on the icons below for a snapshot of each category.

Quality of Life Leadership Resource Allocation Natural World Climate and Resilience

Achievements in the Quality of Life category address a project’s impact on host and affected communities, from the health and wellbeing of individuals to the wellbeing of larger social fabric as a whole. Quality of Life focuses on assessing whether infrastructure projects align with community goals, are incorporated into existing community networks, and will benefit the community in the long term. Community members affected by the project are considered important stakeholders in the decision-making process.

Leadership – Successful sustainable projects require a new way of thinking about how projects are developed and delivered. Project teams are most successful if they communicate and collaborate early on, involve a wide variety of people in creating ideas for the project, and understand the long-term, holistic view of the project and its life cycle.

Resource Allocation – Resources are the assets that are needed to build infrastructure and keep it running. It concerns itself with the quantity, source, and characteristics of these resources and their impacts on the overall sustainability of the project.

Natural World – Infrastructure projects have an impact on the natural world around them, including habitats, species, and nonliving natural systems. The natural systems around us perform critical functions called ecosystem services that provide us with clean air, clean water, healthy food, and hazard mitigation. The way a project is located within theses systems and the new elements they may introduce to a system and create unwanted impacts on these ecosystem services.

The scope of Climate and Resilience is two-fold: minimizing emissions that may contribute to climate change and other short-and-long-term risks, and ensuring that infrastructure projects are resilient. To be resilient, infrastructure must be informed, resourceful, robust, redundant flexible, integrated, and inclusive.

The Envision framework is integrated with the Envision Sustainability Professional (ENV SP) credential. Through the ENV SP, ISI recognizes and brings attention to individuals trained and dedicated to developing more sustainable infrastructure. When used as a self-assessment tool Envision helps practitioners better understand and recognize their project’s contribution to sustainability.

Envision can also be used towards third-party verification of project assessments though ISI’s Verification Program, publicly recognizing infrastructure projects that make exemplary progress toward sustainability. More than 140 projects representing a broad spectrum of infrastructure sectors have completed verification and been recognized with an Envision award.

Collectively the commitments of public agencies, companies, and universities to use Envision draws needed attention to the value and importance of developing infrastructure more sustainably.

Perhaps most importantly, Envision is a shared platform for effectively collaborating and communicating around the complex concepts and challenges of sustainability, resiliency, and equity. Successful use of the framework in either self-assessments or third-party verifications necessitates collaboration, teamwork, and learning. Envision’s easy-to-understand approach to sustainable infrastructure becomes a tool for facilitating project team collaboration, inter-organizational cooperation, and public engagement and communication.

Components of the Envision framework

Envision Guidance Manual – The written framework.
Envision Pre-Assessment Checklist – An early-phase high-level pre-assessment.
Envision Online Scoresheet – The detailed online assessment tool and calculator.
Envision Sustainability Professional Credential – Professional training on Envision use.
Envision Verification – Independent third-party project review process.
Envision Awards – Recognition for qualifying verified projects

Ways to get started

Create an account
Use the Envision checklist (available in your user account dashboard)
Create a project
Pursue your ENV SP