Strategies for urban drought risk management: a comparison of 10 large cities

Sustainable development of cities requires robust water supply systems, yet many cities need to resort to ad hoc measures when faced with a drought. This article aims to explore how cities can do better in reducing the risk of water shortage due to drought. To that end, a classification of drought measures in urban water supply systems is proposed, and then applied to 10 cities that recently faced a drought. We find that these cities used a relatively limited number and variety of measures. The classification can help cities evaluate different types of measures for reducing long-term water stress and limit the impact of extreme droughts.