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Eamen L, Brouwer R, Razavi S. Integrated modelling to assess the impacts of water stress in a transboundary river basin: Bridging local-scale water resource operations to a river basin economy. THE SCIENCE OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT 2021; 800:149543. [PMID: 34392228 DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.149543] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/27/2021] [Revised: 07/14/2021] [Accepted: 08/05/2021] [Indexed: 06/13/2023]
Abstract
In this study, we develop a hydro-economic modelling framework for river-basin scales by integrating a water resources system model and an economic model. This framework allows for the representation of both local-scale features, such as reservoirs, diversions, and water licenses and priorities, and regional- and provincial-scale features, such as cross-sectoral and inter-regional connectedness and trade flows. This framework is able to: (a) represent nonlinearities and interactions that cannot be represented by either of typical water resources or economic models; (b) analyze the sensitivity of macro-scale economy to different local water management decisions (called 'decision levers' herein); and (c) identify water allocation strategies that are economically sound across sectors and regions. This integrated model is applied to the multi-jurisdictional Saskatchewan River Basin in Western Canada. Our findings reveal that an economically optimal water allocation strategy can mitigate the economic losses of water stress up to 80% compared to the existing water allocation strategy. We draw lessons from our analysis and discuss how integrated inter-regional hydro-economic modelling can benefit vulnerability assessment and robust decision making.
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Affiliation(s)
- Leila Eamen
- School of Environment and Sustainability, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada; Global Institute for Water Security, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada.
| | - Roy Brouwer
- Department of Economics, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada; The Water Institute, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada
| | - Saman Razavi
- School of Environment and Sustainability, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada; Global Institute for Water Security, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada; Department of Civil, Geological, and Environmental Engineering, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada
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Elsawah S, Hamilton SH, Jakeman AJ, Rothman D, Schweizer V, Trutnevyte E, Carlsen H, Drakes C, Frame B, Fu B, Guivarch C, Haasnoot M, Kemp-Benedict E, Kok K, Kosow H, Ryan M, van Delden H. Scenario processes for socio-environmental systems analysis of futures: A review of recent efforts and a salient research agenda for supporting decision making. THE SCIENCE OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT 2020; 729:138393. [PMID: 32498149 DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.138393] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/14/2020] [Revised: 03/31/2020] [Accepted: 03/31/2020] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
This paper reviews the latest research on scenarios including the processes and products for socio-environmental systems (SES) analysis, modeling and decision making. A group of scenario researchers and practitioners participated in a workshop to discuss consolidation of existing research on the development and use of scenario analysis in exploring and understanding the interplay between human and environmental systems. This paper presents an extended overview of the workshop discussions and follow-up review work. It is structured around the essential challenges that are crucial to progress support of decision making and learning with respect to our highly uncertain socio-environmental futures. It identifies a practical research agenda where challenges are grouped according to the process stage at which they are most significant: before, during, and after the creation of the scenarios as products. These challenges for SES include: enhancing the role of stakeholder and public engagement in the co-development of scenarios, linking scenarios across multiple geographical, sectoral and temporal scales, improving the links between the qualitative and quantitative aspects of scenario analysis, addressing uncertainties especially surprise, addressing scenario diversity and their consistency together, communicating scenarios including visualization methods, and linking scenarios to decision making.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sondoss Elsawah
- Capability Systems Centre, University of New South Wales, Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra, ACT, Australia; Institute for Water Futures, Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia.
| | - Serena H Hamilton
- Institute for Water Futures, Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia; CSIRO Land and Water, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | - Anthony J Jakeman
- Institute for Water Futures, Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | - Dale Rothman
- University of Denver, Josef Korbel School of International Studies, Denver, USA
| | - Vanessa Schweizer
- Department of Knowledge Integration, Faculty of Environment, University of Waterloo, Canada
| | - Evelina Trutnevyte
- Renewable Energy Systems, Institute for Environmental Sciences, Section of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Geneva, Switzerland
| | | | | | - Bob Frame
- Gateway Antarctica, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
| | - Baihua Fu
- Institute for Water Futures, Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | | | - Marjolijn Haasnoot
- Deltares, Delft, the Netherlands; Utrecht University, Utrecht, the Netherlands
| | | | - Kasper Kok
- Environmental Systems Analysis Group, Wageningen University & Research, Wageningen, the Netherlands
| | - Hannah Kosow
- ZIRIUS - Research Center for Interdisciplinary Risk and Innovation Studies, University of Stuttgart, Germany
| | - Mike Ryan
- Capability Systems Centre, University of New South Wales, Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | - Hedwig van Delden
- Research Institute for Knowledge Systems (RIKS), Hertogsingel 11B, 6211 NC Maastricht, the Netherlands; School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering, The University of Adelaide, Australia
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Shepherd TG, Boyd E, Calel RA, Chapman SC, Dessai S, Dima-West IM, Fowler HJ, James R, Maraun D, Martius O, Senior CA, Sobel AH, Stainforth DA, Tett SFB, Trenberth KE, van den Hurk BJJM, Watkins NW, Wilby RL, Zenghelis DA. Storylines: an alternative approach to representing uncertainty in physical aspects of climate change. CLIMATIC CHANGE 2018; 151:555-571. [PMID: 30880852 PMCID: PMC6394420 DOI: 10.1007/s10584-018-2317-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 40] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/14/2017] [Accepted: 10/19/2018] [Indexed: 05/05/2023]
Abstract
As climate change research becomes increasingly applied, the need for actionable information is growing rapidly. A key aspect of this requirement is the representation of uncertainties. The conventional approach to representing uncertainty in physical aspects of climate change is probabilistic, based on ensembles of climate model simulations. In the face of deep uncertainties, the known limitations of this approach are becoming increasingly apparent. An alternative is thus emerging which may be called a 'storyline' approach. We define a storyline as a physically self-consistent unfolding of past events, or of plausible future events or pathways. No a priori probability of the storyline is assessed; emphasis is placed instead on understanding the driving factors involved, and the plausibility of those factors. We introduce a typology of four reasons for using storylines to represent uncertainty in physical aspects of climate change: (i) improving risk awareness by framing risk in an event-oriented rather than a probabilistic manner, which corresponds more directly to how people perceive and respond to risk; (ii) strengthening decision-making by allowing one to work backward from a particular vulnerability or decision point, combining climate change information with other relevant factors to address compound risk and develop appropriate stress tests; (iii) providing a physical basis for partitioning uncertainty, thereby allowing the use of more credible regional models in a conditioned manner and (iv) exploring the boundaries of plausibility, thereby guarding against false precision and surprise. Storylines also offer a powerful way of linking physical with human aspects of climate change.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Emily Boyd
- Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies, 221 00 Lund, Sweden
| | - Raphael A. Calel
- McCourt School of Public Policy, Georgetown University, Washington, DC 20057 USA
- London School of Economics, London, WC2A 2AE UK
| | - Sandra C. Chapman
- Centre for Fusion, Space and Astrophysics, Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL UK
- Center for Space Physics, Department of Astronomy, Boston University, Boston, MA 02215 USA
| | - Suraje Dessai
- Sustainability Research Institute and ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy, School of Earth & Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds, LS2 9JT UK
| | | | - Hayley J. Fowler
- School of Engineering, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU UK
| | - Rachel James
- Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford, Oxford, OX1 3QY UK
- Department of Oceanography, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, 7701 South Africa
| | - Douglas Maraun
- Wegener Center for Climate and Global Change, University of Graz, 8010 Graz, Austria
| | - Olivia Martius
- Institute of Geography, Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Bern, 3012 Bern, Switzerland
| | | | - Adam H. Sobel
- Department of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics and Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027 USA
| | - David A. Stainforth
- London School of Economics, London, WC2A 2AE UK
- Centre for Fusion, Space and Astrophysics, Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL UK
| | - Simon F. B. Tett
- School of Geosciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, EH9 3FF UK
| | | | - Bart J. J. M. van den Hurk
- Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI), 3730 AE De Bilt, Netherlands
- Institute for Environmental Studies, VU University Amsterdam, 1081 HV Amsterdam, Netherlands
| | - Nicholas W. Watkins
- London School of Economics, London, WC2A 2AE UK
- Centre for Fusion, Space and Astrophysics, Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL UK
- Center for Space Physics, Department of Astronomy, Boston University, Boston, MA 02215 USA
- Faculty of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
| | - Robert L. Wilby
- Department of Geography, Loughborough University, Loughborough, LE11 3TU UK
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Kumar V, Del Vasto-Terrientes L, Valls A, Schuhmacher M. Adaptation strategies for water supply management in a drought prone Mediterranean river basin: Application of outranking method. THE SCIENCE OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT 2016; 540:344-357. [PMID: 26277442 DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2015.06.062] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/30/2015] [Revised: 06/16/2015] [Accepted: 06/16/2015] [Indexed: 06/04/2023]
Abstract
The regional water allocation planning is one of those complex decision problems where holistic approach to water supply management considering different criteria would be valuable. However, multi-criteria decision making with diverse indicators measured on different scales and uncertainty levels is difficult to solve. Objective of this paper is to develop scenarios for the future imbalances in water supply and demand for a water stressed Mediterranean area of Northern Spain (Tarragona) and to test the applicability and suitability of an outranking method ELECTRE-III-H for evaluating sectoral water allocation policies. This study is focused on the use of alternative water supply scenarios to fulfil the demand of water from three major sectors: domestic, industrial and agricultural. A detail scenario planning for regional water demand and supply has been discussed. For each future scenario of climate change, the goal is to obtain a ranking of a set of possible actions with regards to different types of indicators (costs, water stress and environmental impact). The analytical method used is based on outranking models for decision aid with hierarchical structures of criteria and ranking alternatives using partial preorders based on pairwise preference relations. We compare several adaptation measures including alternative water sources (reclaimed water and desalination); inter basin water transfer and sectoral demand management coming from industry, agriculture and domestic sectors and tested the sustainability of management actions for different climate change scenarios. Results have shown use of alternative water resources as the most reliable alternative with medium reclaimed water reuse in industry and agriculture and low to medium use of desalination water in domestic and industrial sectors as the best alternative. The proposed method has several advantages such as the management of heterogeneous scales of measurement without requiring any artificial transformation and the management of uncertainty by means of comparisons at a qualitative level in terms of the decision maker preferences.
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Affiliation(s)
- Vikas Kumar
- Environmental Analysis and Management Group, Departament d'Enginyeria Química, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Av. Països Catalans, 26, 43007 Tarragona Spain.
| | - Luis Del Vasto-Terrientes
- ITAKA research group, Departament d'Enginyeria Informàtica i Matemàtiques, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Av. Països Catalans, 26, 43007 Tarragona Spain
| | - Aida Valls
- ITAKA research group, Departament d'Enginyeria Informàtica i Matemàtiques, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Av. Països Catalans, 26, 43007 Tarragona Spain
| | - Marta Schuhmacher
- Environmental Analysis and Management Group, Departament d'Enginyeria Química, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Av. Països Catalans, 26, 43007 Tarragona Spain
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Henriques C, Garnett K, Weatherhead EK, Lickorish FA, Forrow D, Delgado J. The future water environment--using scenarios to explore the significant water management challenges in England and Wales to 2050. THE SCIENCE OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT 2015; 512-513:381-396. [PMID: 25638653 DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2014.12.047] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/17/2014] [Revised: 12/17/2014] [Accepted: 12/17/2014] [Indexed: 06/04/2023]
Abstract
Society gets numerous benefits from the water environment. It is crucial to ensure that water management practices deliver these benefits over the long-term in a sustainable and cost-effective way. Currently, hydromorphological alterations and nutrient enrichment pose the greatest challenges in European water bodies. The rapidly changing climatic and socio-economic boundary conditions pose further challenges to water management decisions and the achievement of policy goals. Scenarios are a strategic tool useful in conducting systematic investigations of future uncertainties pertaining to water management. In this study, the use of scenarios revealed water management challenges for England and Wales to 2050. A set of existing scenarios relevant to river basin management were elaborated through stakeholder workshops and interviews, relying on expert knowledge to identify drivers of change, their interdependencies, and influence on system dynamics. In a set of four plausible alternative futures, the causal chain from driving forces through pressures to states, impacts and responses (DPSIR framework) was explored. The findings suggest that scenarios driven by short-term economic growth and competitiveness undermine current environmental legislative requirements and exacerbate the negative impacts of climate change, producing a general deterioration of water quality and physical habitats, as well as reduced water availability with adverse implications for the environment, society and economy. Conversely, there are substantial environmental improvements under the scenarios characterised by long-term sustainability, though achieving currently desired environmental outcomes still poses challenges. The impacts vary across contrasting generic catchment types that exhibit distinct future water management challenges. The findings suggest the need to address hydromorphological alterations, nutrient enrichment and nitrates in drinking water, which are all likely to be exacerbated in the future. Future-proofing river basin management measures that deal with these challenges is crucial moving forward. The use of scenarios to future-proof strategy, policy and delivery mechanisms is discussed to inform next steps.
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Affiliation(s)
- C Henriques
- Cranfield Water Science Institute, Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK.
| | - K Garnett
- Institute for Environment, Health, Risks and Futures, Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK
| | - E K Weatherhead
- Cranfield Water Science Institute, Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK
| | - F A Lickorish
- Institute for Environment, Health, Risks and Futures, Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK
| | - D Forrow
- Evidence Directorate, Environment Agency, Red Kite House, Wallingford, Oxfordshire OX10 8BD, UK
| | - J Delgado
- Institute for Environment, Health, Risks and Futures, Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK
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Klijn F, Kreibich H, de Moel H, Penning-Rowsell E. Adaptive flood risk management planning based on a comprehensive flood risk conceptualisation. MITIGATION AND ADAPTATION STRATEGIES FOR GLOBAL CHANGE 2015; 20:845-864. [PMID: 30197554 PMCID: PMC6108000 DOI: 10.1007/s11027-015-9638-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/06/2013] [Accepted: 02/11/2015] [Indexed: 05/30/2023]
Abstract
Densely populated deltas are so vulnerable to sea level rise and climate change that they cannot wait for global mitigation to become effective. The Netherlands therefore puts huge efforts in adaptation research and planning for the future, for example through the national research programme Knowledge for Climate and the Delta Programme for the Twenty-first century. Flood risk is one of the key issues addressed in both programmes. Adaptive management planning should rely on a sound ex-ante policy analysis which encompasses a future outlook, establishing whether a policy transition is required, an assessment of alternative flood risk management strategies, and their planning in anticipation without running the risk of regret of doing too little too late or too much too early. This endeavour, addressed as adaptive delta management, calls for new approaches, especially because of uncertainties about long-term future developments. For flood risk management, it also entails reconsideration of the underlying principles and of the application of portfolios of technical measures versus spatial planning and other policy instruments. To this end, we first developed a conceptualisation of flood risk which reconciles the different approaches of flood defence management practice and spatial planning practice in order to bridge the gap between these previously detached fields. Secondly, we looked abroad in order to be better able to reflect critically on a possible Dutch bias which could have resulted from many centuries of experience of successful adaptation to increasing flood risk, but which may no longer be sustainable into the future. In this paper, we explain the multiple conceptualisation of flood risk and argue that explicitly distinguishing exposure determinants as a new concept may help to bridge the gap between engineers and spatial planners, wherefore we show how their different conceptualisations influence the framing of the adaptation challenge. Also, we identify what the Netherlands may learn from neighbouring countries with a different framing of the future flood risk challenge.
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Affiliation(s)
- Frans Klijn
- Deltares, PO Box 177, 2600 MH Delft, The Netherlands
| | - Heidi Kreibich
- GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, Germany
| | - Hans de Moel
- Amsterdam Free University, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Edmund Penning-Rowsell
- Flood Hazard Research Centre, Middlesex University, London/Oxford University, London, England USA
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