01459nas a2200121   4500008004100000245006500041210005900106260001200165520104300177100002401220700002401244856006901268       2014                        eng d00aThe future of Waste Water Treatment: a Delphi-based approach0 afuture of Waste Water Treatment a Delphibased approach  aLeipzig3 aCapital intensive and path-dependent sectors are highly vulnerable to changing framework conditions such as demographic change, technological advancements, a stricter legislation or climate change. Deci-sion-makers are often not aware of the long-term dynamics of systems and mostly rely on forecasts and the assumption that the future can be predicted based on extrapolations of past trends. We present a sce-nario study on the future of waste water treatment in the year 2050 in which we investigated the possi-bilities of scenario planning. We conducted a case study in East Germany due to the challenges this sec-tor faces: Important parts of the sanitation system were modernized due to legislative requirements, but a decreasing population, reinforced by structural and economic changes, was not expected. Following a Delphi-based scenario approach we first conducted a PESTEL-analysis and subsequently applied Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping for developing four scenarios: Business as usual, Watershed-first, Recycling-first and Mega-City.1 aGünther, Edeltraud1 aNowack, Dr., Martin  uhttps://degrowth.community/conference2014/scientific-papers/3398