Resilience Concepts for Water Resource Systems

This paper reviews existing approaches to system resilience, and proposes a scheme to quantify the resilience of water resource systems. In general, three aspects of resilience are considered in water resource systems: (1) that against crossing a performance threshold; (2) that for response and recovery after disturbances; and (3) that of adaptive capacity. Conventionally these aspects are treated separately without considering possible functional relationships or interdependencies. We argue that the adaptive capacity of the system is better treated as an input variable of the other two aspects of resilience, and that response/recovery may be considered only when the performance threshold is not crossed. Because of the dynamic and evolving nature of water resource systems, proper consideration of uncertainty and associated information, whether obtained from well-defined numerical data or vague linguistic articulation, is essential for better understanding and proper management of their resilience. Constantly monitoring, adjusting, and engaging in long-term planning for resilience enhancement is important to maintaining a resilient system.