1st Edition

The Resilience Approach to Climate Adaptation Applied for Flood Risk UNESCO-IHE PhD Thesis

By Berry Gersonius Copyright 2012
    170 Pages
    by CRC Press

    Nowadays, the uncertainties associated with the process of making decisions for water infrastructure investments can be significant and arise from, amongst other factors, a lack of knowledge about primary external drivers, like climate change. New and improved methods for the assessment climate impacts and adaptation are needed to address these uncertainties; otherwise, investment strategies can be maladaptive, resulting in either increased risks or unnecessary costs of potentially irreversible measures. In response to this need, there has been a significant expansion of the approaches and methods in use. This book provides practical experience with two different assessment methods: Real-In-Options and Adaptation Tipping Points. These were selected because they both provide insight into and promote the ability of the system to deal with future change and thus can be used within a resilience approach. The resilience approach takes a dynamic perspective on adaptive processes and the effects of these processes at/across different spatio-temporal scales. Although the methods share a similar aim, they have considerable differences in orientation and application. This book discusses the concept, procedures, case examples and benefits/limitations of each method, examining its usefulness for informing investment decisions. It gives specific recommendations on which method to use under what circumstances.

    1 Introduction and Overview; 2 Definition and assessment of resilience for socio-technical systems; 3 Adaptive Policy Making; 4 Real In Options; 5 Comparing Real In Options and Net Present Value; 6 Adaptation Tipping Point - Adaptation Mainstreaming Opportunity; 7 Comparing Real In Options and Adaptation Tipping Points; 8 Conclusions and recommendations; 9 Bibliography

    Biography

    Berry Gersonius (MSc in Civil Engineering, specialisation in Water Infrastructure Planning) is lecturer in Urban Flood Resilience at UNESCO-IHE. The scope of his work covers education and research in the field of climate change adaptation and urban flood (risk) management. In 2008, he started a PhD study, entitled ‘Beyond a stationary hydrology: the resilience approach to the adaptation of flooding systems to climate change’. His main research interest is the operationalisation of resilience in context of urban flood (risk) management and climate change adaptation. He has been involved with a number of (practical) research projects, including Water Robust Building, Urban Flood Management, and the project Integrated Urban Water System Interactions that is part of UNESCO - IHP VI. Currently he is involved in the European Interreg IVB project MARE and FP7 project FloodProbe.