Resilience Assessment and Critical Point Identification for Urban Water Supply Systems under Uncertain Scenarios

Abstract

The urban water supply system environment is becoming more complicated and unpredictable than ever before in the context of global climate change and expanding urbanization. Existing studies have adopted either static or dynamic approaches to assess the resilience of water supply systems without combining the two. Previous literature mostly establishes rigid quantitative metrics for resilience assessment, often without depicting the dynamics and adaptability of system resilience. For example, these studies usually fail to provide a critical point for identifying system resilience. To accurately describe the dynamics and adaptability of water supply system resilience under uncertain scenarios, in this study, we constructed a comprehensive framework based on the qualitative assessment of the input parameters, combining static and dynamic assessment, with the latter playing a dominant role based on the system perspective of pressure–state–influence–response. Taking Qingdao as a case study, we combined this framework with the system resilience theory, and statically assessed the five types of capitals and three attributes of resilience with the capital portfolio approach (CPA). Then, we dynamically assessed the resilience of urban water supply systems and identified critical points with the dynamic socio-technical model coupled with system resilience and the fitting analysis method. The results are as follows: (1) the static assessment results demonstrate an imbalanced development in the levels of the five types of capitals (financial capital, management efficiency, infrastructure, available water resources, and adaptation) and three attributes (robustness, recoverability, and adaptability) in the water supply systems of Qingdao. (2) The dynamic assessment results show that the current resilience trajectory of the water supply systems in Qingdao is that of a city in transition. (3) The fitting analysis shows that robustness (RB) has a linear relationship with resilience, recoverability (RE) has a non-linear relationship with resilience, and the critical points are RB = 0.70 and RE = 1.20. The research findings provide a reference for studying resilience mechanisms, internal attribute relationships, and resilience enhancement measures of urban water supply systems.