Articles
Assessment of Flooding Impact on Water Supply Systems: A Comprehensive Approach Based on DSS
1 Introduction
The Water Supply System (WSS) complexity is related to the dynamic nature of the characteristics infuencing it, as climate change and increasing demand due to population (Amarasinghe et al. 2017; Ghandi and Roozbahani 2020). The water supply, along with the sanitation, is considered a main factor in environmental sustainability, human health, social services and resilience (Luh et al. 2017).
The service interruption due to disasters is a scenario that must be considered for WSS design and management. Diferent hazards could impact the WSS, such as drought and earthquake (Pagano et al. 2021; Amarasinghe et al. 2017), operational losses (Bozorgi et al. 2021), accidental pollution (Di Cristo and Leopardi 2008) and foods (Arrighi et al. 2017; Chau et al. 2021). Assessing the impact of fooding on WSS requires a comprehensive approach able to account for several processes potentially leading to interruption of water supply and/or water quality degradation, which in turns involve several scales of analysis, from the catchment area to the distribution network. The assessment of natural hazards impact on WSS has to be involved and managed in the Water Safety Plans (WSP), whose implementation is supported and advised by the WHO (2017).
During fooding, scarcity of safe drinking water (McCluskey 2001; Bariweni et al. 2012), disruption of water treatment facilities and, as a consequence, disease outbreak (Shimi et al. 2010; Speranza 2010) are the most frequent problems. Moreover, the reduction of groundwater quality can be caused by pollutants transport and food efect on groundwater recharge (Comte et al. 2018; Alam et al. 2020; Zhang et al. 2017).
Severe fooding can also cause interruption of abstraction from artifcial reservoirs and quality deterioration of stored water due to turbidity (Chou and Wu 2010). Flooding can afect well felds and result in pump failure and/or ingress of chemically/microbiologically contaminated food water into damaged wells (Joannou et al. 2019; Sweya and Wilkinson 2020). It can cause damages also to the treatment component producing interruption of the treatment/water quality control (Hedera 1987; McCluskey 2001; Barnes et al. 2012; Koh et al. 2017). Lastly, fooding can afect the distribution system damaging the infrastructures leading to disruption of the supply service and contamination of the water resources (Arrighi et al. 2017; Joannou et al. 2019).
In this context, the MUHA project, funded by the European INTERREG V-B AdriaticIonian ADRION Programme 2014–2020 (https://muha.adrioninterreg.eu/), developed a tool for WAter Safety Planning Procedures Decision Support System (WASPP–DSS).
MUHA aims to improve forecasting, prevention and mitigation capacities of diferent risks in WSSs, strengthening cooperation between civil protection systems and operators at national, European and international levels in the implementation of the WSP.
This process requires common risk analysis tools as basis for sound intervention planning. Some elements of novelty with respect to both the WHO guidelines and the available national guidelines are: 1) the tool is based on a matrix approach that crosses the WSS components with hazards potentially threatening the water safety, as required by the WHO for water safety plans development; 2) the tool allows to fully account for the quantitative aspects impacting on water safety due to climate change and more in general, quantity issues as explicitly mentioned in WHO guidelines.
In this work, Sect. 2 describes the procedure to evaluate the fooding impact on WSS and the main characteristics of the tool; in Sect. 3 the application of the tool to three case studies is presented and, lastly, Sects. 4 and 5 outline the discussion and the conclusions.
Assessment of Flooding Impact on Water Supply Systems: A Comprehensive Approach Based on DSS
The Water Supply System (WSS) complexity is related to the dynamic nature of the characteristics infuencing it, as climate change and increasing demand due to population (Amarasinghe et al. 2017; Ghandi and Roozbahani 2020). The water supply, along with the sanitation, is considered a main factor in environmental sustainability, human health, social services and resilience (Luh et al. 2017).
The service interruption due to disasters is a scenario that must be considered for WSS design and management. Diferent hazards could impact the WSS, such as drought and earthquake (Pagano et al. 2021; Amarasinghe et al. 2017), operational losses (Bozorgi et al. 2021), accidental pollution (Di Cristo and Leopardi 2008) and foods (Arrighi et al. 2017; Chau et al. 2021). Assessing the impact of fooding on WSS requires a comprehensive approach able to account for several processes potentially leading to interruption of water supply and/or water quality degradation, which in turns involve several scales of analysis, from the catchment area to the distribution network. The assessment of natural hazards impact on WSS has to be involved and managed in the Water Safety Plans (WSP), whose implementation is supported and advised by the WHO (2017).
During fooding, scarcity of safe drinking water (McCluskey 2001; Bariweni et al. 2012), disruption of water treatment facilities and, as a consequence, disease outbreak (Shimi et al. 2010; Speranza 2010) are the most frequent problems. Moreover, the reduction of groundwater quality can be caused by pollutants transport and food efect on groundwater recharge (Comte et al. 2018; Alam et al. 2020; Zhang et al. 2017).
Severe fooding can also cause interruption of abstraction from artifcial reservoirs and quality deterioration of stored water due to turbidity (Chou and Wu 2010). Flooding can afect well felds and result in pump failure and/or ingress of chemically/microbiologically contaminated food water into damaged wells (Joannou et al. 2019; Sweya and Wilkinson 2020). It can cause damages also to the treatment component producing interruption of the treatment/water quality control (Hedera 1987; McCluskey 2001; Barnes et al. 2012; Koh et al. 2017). Lastly, fooding can afect the distribution system damaging the infrastructures leading to disruption of the supply service and contamination of the water resources (Arrighi et al. 2017; Joannou et al. 2019).
In this context, the MUHA project, funded by the European INTERREG V-B AdriaticIonian ADRION Programme 2014–2020 (https://muha.adrioninterreg.eu/), developed a tool for WAter Safety Planning Procedures Decision Support System (WASPP–DSS).
MUHA aims to improve forecasting, prevention and mitigation capacities of diferent risks in WSSs, strengthening cooperation between civil protection systems and operators at national, European and international levels in the implementation of the WSP.
This process requires common risk analysis tools as basis for sound intervention planning. Some elements of novelty with respect to both the WHO guidelines and the available national guidelines are: 1) the tool is based on a matrix approach that crosses the WSS components with hazards potentially threatening the water safety, as required by the WHO for water safety plans development; 2) the tool allows to fully account for the quantitative aspects impacting on water safety due to climate change and more in general, quantity issues as explicitly mentioned in WHO guidelines.
In this work, Sect. 2 describes the procedure to evaluate the fooding impact on WSS and the main characteristics of the tool; in Sect. 3 the application of the tool to three case studies is presented and, lastly, Sects. 4 and 5 outline the discussion and the conclusions.
Assessment of Flooding Impact on Water Supply Systems: A Comprehensive Approach Based on DSS
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WaterTuesday, December 30, 2025