Civil Engineering and Environmental Systems Best Paper Award

The journal Civil Engineering and Environmental Systems recognises excellence in research through the annual Best Paper Award. The award is given for the work published in the previous year that best meets the goal of the journal to publish work of long-lasting value in the study of civil engineering and environmental systems. There is no nomination process and all papers will be considered. The editors will make a decision on the award, and will call in members of the editorial board to assist in the case of potential conflicts of interest. Offers for sponsorship for the annual award will be considered. The first award was made for work published in 2019. For more information on making a submission to the journal, please visit the journal website.

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Civil Engineering and Environmental Systems would like to announce a Best Paper Award winner for 2019 as chosen by the journal’s editors. The award goes to the paper ‘Faith and fakes – dealing with critical information in decision analysis’ by Linda Nielsen, Sebastian Tølbøll Glavind, Jianjun Qin and Michael H. Faber published as part of the special issue, New Challenges in Decision Making: A Collection of Papers from the Tenth International Forum on Engineering Decision Making (IFED), Volume 36, Issue 1. The paper addresses the relevant problem of how we make decisions when the information relied upon could be in error or even ‘fake news’. It shows how we can build a set of scenarios to span the range of decision trees needed, and then use value of information methods to identify ways to reduce overall uncertainty. It includes a historical, cultural, and philosophical analysis of truth, reality, and perception in terms of how they relate to the problem. The paper follows the path followed by the journal’s editors since 1983 to advance systems thinking and systems techniques. It has strong links to the past while presenting fresh insights with long-lasting value.