Planning resilient water resources and communities: the need for a bottom-up systems approach

Abstract

A robust understanding of water security, and the potential contributions made by alternative management strategies, is needed for a world challenged by population growth and climate-driven resource scarcity. This understanding is vital for realising our visions and plans to build future sustainable and resilient cities that have lesser impacts on increasingly scarce environmental and economic resources. The implications of making average demand assumptions on water security predictions and distribution patterns are investigated using calibrated bottom-up multi-scale numerical (Systems Framework) models of the Greater Melbourne and Sydney water networks and observed demand data. The calibrated Systems Framework models, which are highly spatially and temporally resolved, are progressively modified through erosion of the temporal and spatial granularity of their boundary conditions by replacing demands with various average assumptions. It is shown that average assumptions lead to material differences in model predictive behaviour, and that the directions of these differences are unpredictable and sometimes lead to counter-intuitive outcomes. It is concluded that the application of average assumptions of any kind is problematic (from both pure statistical and numerical modelling standpoints) and has the potential to heavily influence infrastructure investment and, more broadly, policy direction.