| Title: | Complex adaptive systems approach to simulate the sustainability of water resources and urbanization |
| Authors: | Giacomoni, M.H., L. Kanta and E.M. Zechman |
| Year: | 2013 |
| Journal: | Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management |
| Volume (Issue): | 139(5) |
| Pages: | 554-564 |
| Article ID: | |
| DOI: | 10.1061/(ASCE)WR.1943-5452.0000302 |
| URL (non-DOI journals): | |
| Model: | SWAT |
| Broad Application Category: | hydrologic only |
| Primary Application Category: | model and/or data interface |
| Secondary Application Category: | hydrologic assessment |
| Watershed Description: | 370 km^2 Village Creek, which contributes 55% of the water used by the City of Arlington in north central Texas, U.S. |
| Calibration Summary: | |
| Validation Summary: | |
| General Comments: | |
| Abstract: | Urban water resources should be managed to meet conflicting demands for environmental health, economic prosperity, and social equity for present and future generations. While the sustainability of water resources can depend on dynamic interactions among natural, social, and infrastructure systems, typical water resource planning and management approaches are based on methodologies that ignore feedbacks and adaptations among these systems. This research develops and demonstrates a new complex adaptive systems approach to model the dynamic interactions among population growth, land-use change, the hydrologic cycle, residential water use, and interbasin transfers. Agent-based and cellular automaton models, representing consumers and policymakers who make land- and water-use decisions, are coupled with hydrologic models. The framework is applied for an illustrative case study to simulate urbanization and the water supply
system over a long-term planning horizon. Results indicate that interactions among the decentralized decisions of individual residents can significantly influence system-wide sustainability. Adaptive management policies are included to restrict the water use and land use of consumers as the availability of water decreases. These strategies are simulated and assessed based on their abilities to increase the sustainability of the water supply system under the stresses of population growth, land-use change, and drought. |
| Language: | English |
| Keywords: | Complex adaptive systems; Water resources sustainability; Adaptive management; Urbanization; Sociotechnical system; Multiscale modeling |