scholarly journals Following a Step by Step Development of a Resilience Action Plan

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (21) ◽  
pp. 9017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Adriana Cardoso ◽  
Maria João Telhado ◽  
Maria do Céu Almeida ◽  
Rita Salgado Brito ◽  
Cristina Pereira ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Cycle ◽  
Action Plan ◽  
Electric Energy ◽  
Action Planning ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Urban Services ◽  
The City ◽  
Water Waste

According to the United Nations, by 2030, 60% of the world’s population will live in cities, and 70% by 2050. Both consolidated and fast urbanizing areas face diverse acute shocks from natural disasters and long-term stresses, such as the effects of climate change. Therefore, there is a need for cities to implement plans for increasing resilience and improving preparedness to cope with both acute shocks and long-term stresses. Development of resilience action plans (RAP) constitutes an important process for the cities to plan their resilience enhancement in the long, medium, and short terms. These are key tools for the city, considering the associated complexity, uncertainties, data scarcity, interdependencies among urban services provided in the city, as well as involved stakeholders. Herein, a framework is presented to support city resilience action planning related to climate change through a multisector approach. The framework was applied step by step to three cities—Barcelona, Bristol, and Lisbon—and their RAPs to climate change provide roadmaps for resilience, having the urban water cycle as the core. In these plans, urban services are included, given their interactions and contributions to city’s resilience. Addressed services are water supply, wastewater, storm water, waste, electric energy, and mobility.

scholarly journals RAF Resilience Assessment Framework—A Tool to Support Cities’ Action Planning

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (6) ◽  
pp. 2349 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Adriana Cardoso ◽  
Rita Salgado Brito ◽  
Cristina Pereira ◽  
Andoni Gonzalez ◽  
John Stevens ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Urban System ◽  
Action Planning ◽  
Sustainable Urban Development ◽  
Assessment Framework ◽  
Urban Services ◽  
System A ◽  
The City ◽  
Resilience Assessment

Urban areas are dynamic, facing evolving hazards, having interacting strategic services and assets. Their management involves multiple stakeholders bringing additional complexity. Potential impacts of climate dynamics may aggravate current conditions and the appearance of new hazards. These challenges require an integrated and forward-looking approach to resilient and sustainable urban development, being essential to identify the real needs for its achievement. Several frameworks for assessing resilience have been developed in different fields. However, considering the focus on climate change and urban services, specific needs were identified, particularly in assessing strategic urban sectors and their interactions with others and with the wider urban system. A resilience assessment framework was developed directing and facilitating an objective-driven resilience diagnosis of urban cities and services. This supports the decision on selection of resilience measures and the development of strategies to enhance resilience, outlining a path to co-build resilience action plans, and to track resilience progress in the city or service over time. This paper presents the framework and the main results of its application to three cities having diverse contexts. It was demonstrated that the framework highlights where cities and urban services stand, regarding resilience to climate change, and identifies the most critical aspects to improve, including expected future impacts.

OPTIONS FOR ASSESSING THE SUITABILITY OF URBAN ENVIRONMENTAL ACUPUNCTURE

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara Vojvodíková ◽  
Jiří Kupka ◽  
Adéla Brázdová ◽  
Radim Fojtík ◽  
Iva Tichá
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Assessment Tool ◽  
Mitigation Measures ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Financial Sustainability ◽  
Technical Solution ◽  
The City

To increase their resilience to climate change, cities are looking to apply elements of urban environmental acupuncture. The essence of such measures is many smaller sites that is functioning as mitigation measures. Many of these small places then create a large overall effect. The advantage of these small-scale measures is that they can be in densely populated areas The assessment tool described in this paper is designed for city representatives and is an aid to assess the suitability of applying a particular measure based on the parameters described. The evaluation itself then helps to decide whether the solution is suitable for a particular site or whether any of the parameters need to be adjusted to make it suitable, or whether it would be appropriate to change the proposed solution. The intention of the evaluation is not to assess the technical solution but relies primarily on the location, long-term (especially financial) sustainability and acceptance by the citizens of the city. The paper presents an example of the application of the evaluation to four sites in city Liptovský Mikuláš, describing the results and identifying parameters that can be improved to ensure the urban environmental acupuncture is accepted by citizens and thus future-proofed.

scholarly journals Distributed Agency Between 2D and 3D Representation of the Subsurface

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 35-56
Author(s):  
Fransje Lucretia Hooimeijer ◽  
Ignace van Campenhout
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Urban Renewal ◽  
Information Needs ◽  
Water Cycle ◽  
Boundary Spanning ◽  
Interdisciplinary Work ◽  
Vital Functions ◽  
3D Information ◽  
2D And 3D ◽  
The City

Although severely altered, the urban subsurface is the base of the natural system, and is crucial for a stable, green, healthy, and liveable city. It is also the technical space, the engine room of the city where vital functions such as water, electricity, sewers, and drainage are located. This hybrid state needs to be recognized when designing resilient and durable (subsurface) infrastructure within urban renewal projects, so as to properly employ the parameters of both natural and technical systems. Interdisciplinary work is needed in order to be able to link natural systems (a) the water cycle, (b) soil and subsurface conditions, (c) soil improvement technology, and (d) opportunities for urban renewal (e.g. urban growth or shrinkage) in an efficient way. The importance of implementing “boundary spanning” when doing interdisciplinary work that deals with the effects of climate change is a widely recognized method, and has been an object of study in the city of Rotterdam in the past decade. The particular need for a “distributed agency” became clear during several research projects dealing with climate change, because it enables different actors to contribute to the development of the project at different phases. The representation of the city as both a natural and technical construction has been tested through the use of 2D and 3D information, which has played a significant role in enabling designs to incorporate the dimension of the subsurface. 2D and 3D information needs to anticipate different scales of specific planning and/or design phases, and they must also address various topics of the subsurface. For each phase of urban development, the distributed agency between 2D and 3D information is investigated and reflected upon. Conclusions are then drawn on the relationship between 2D and 3D information, and how it could relate in a productive, boundary spanning act that is inclusive of the subsurface. Based on these potential connections, the design of a new concept which implements boundary spanning as a facilitator is presented.

Procuring 230 Football Fields of Membrane - Strategy, Results and Lessons Learned

2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 266-272
Author(s):  
J. Grundestam
Keyword(s):  
Wastewater Treatment ◽  
Wastewater Treatment Plants ◽  
Action Plan ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Residential Areas ◽  
The Baltic Sea ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
The City ◽  
The Eu

Stockholm is currently one of Europe’s fastest growing cities, with its population increasing by approximately 1.5% per year, corresponding to 15,000 to 20,000 people. Sweden’s commitment to the Baltic Sea Action Plan and the EU Water Directive will lead to more stringent effluent requirements (6 mg-Tot-N/l, 0.2 mg-Tot-P/l and 6 mg-BOD7/l), and wastewater treatment in Stockholm will require major investment to handle these challenges. As Stockholm Vatten’s two wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) – Bromma, 320,000 people, and Henriksdal, 780,000 people – are both located in or near residential areas in the city, plant development must be coordinated with its needs on economic, political, sustainable and long-term bases. Both WWTPs being facilities located underground also pose a challenge for any extension works.

scholarly journals Human Resource for Climate Change Policy Implementation in Ho Chi Minh City: Situation and Solutions

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ngo Hoai Son ◽  
Nguyen Van Hoa
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Human Resource ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Ho Chi Minh City ◽  
The Core ◽  
Climate Change Response ◽  
Short And Long Term ◽  
Change Response ◽  
The City

As severely affected by climate change, Ho Chi Minh City needs to focus on developing human resource for its climate change response policy. This is because human resource is a key factor fora successful response. The paper uses secondary data from the Department of Natural Resources and Environment of Ho Chi Minh City to analyze the current situation of human resources for climate change of the city, which is devided into 02 main groups as core and complementary groups. The data show that, although the core group is high qualified, it lacks staffs with deep expertise in policy and climate change. For the complementary group, the city has not focused on training in both short and long term. In order to improve the effectiveness of climate change response in the coming years, Ho Chi Minh City needs to implement at least 03 solutions: (01) recruiting additional staffs with expertise in policies and climate change; (02) promote training for the core personnels; and (03) statistics, build and implement in short and long-term training plans for complementary staffs.

scholarly journals Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Urban Water Cycle

2021 ◽  
Vol 02 (03) ◽  
pp. 1-1
Author(s):  
Hadi Heidari ◽  
◽  
Neil S Grigg ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Water Cycle ◽  
Order Effects ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
First Order ◽  
Short And Long Term ◽  
Water Scarce ◽  
And Control ◽  
Urban Water Cycle

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a global crisis spreading to all countries. This study explains and documents the first-order effects of the new coronavirus on the urban water cycle. Urban water systems play an important role in public health because people rely so heavily on water services. Findings address short- and long-term changes in climate variables; availability and accessibility of clean water to prevent and control the spread of coronavirus in water-scarce cities; shifts in habits, behavior, and lifestyles of people and effects on water demand during lockdowns; and role of wastewater treatment in preventing the spread of coronavirus.

Stochastic stress-testing approach for assessing resilience of urban water systems from source to tap

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dionysios Nikolopoulos ◽  
Panagiotis Kossieris ◽  
Christos Makropoulos
Keyword(s):  
Stress Testing ◽  
Water Cycle ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Water System ◽  
Water Systems ◽  
Distribution Model ◽  
Generation Model ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Urban Water Systems

<p>Urban water systems are designed with the goal of delivering their service for several decades.  The infrastructure will inevitably face long-term uncertainty in a multitude of parameters from the hydroclimatic and socioeconomic realms (e.g., climate change, limited supply of water in terms quantity and acceptable quality, population growth, shifting demand patterns, industrialization), as well as from the conceptual realm of the decision maker (e.g., changes in policy, system maintenance incentives, investment rate, expansion plans). Because urban water systems are overly complex, a holistic analysis involves the use of various models that individually pertain to a smaller sub-system and a variety of metrics to assess performance, whereas the analysis is accomplished at different temporal and spatial scales for each sub-system. In this work, we integrate a water resources management model with a water distribution model and a water demand generation model at smaller (household and district) scale, allowing us to simulate urban water systems “from source to tap”, covering the entire water cycle. We also couple a stochastic simulation module that supports the representation of uncertainty throughout the water cycle. The performance of the integrated system under long term uncertainty is assessed with the novel measure of system’s resilience i.e. the degree to which a water system continues to perform under progressively increasing disturbance. This evaluation is essentially a framework of systematic stress-testing, where the disturbance is described via stochastically changing parameters in an ensemble of scenarios that represent future world views. The framework is showcased through a synthesized case study of a medium-sized urban water system.</p><p><strong>Acknowledgement</strong></p><p>This research is carried out / funded in the context of the project “A resilience assessment framework for water supply infrastructure under long-term uncertainty: A Source-to-Tap methodology integrating state of the art computational tools” (MIS 5049174) under the call for proposals “Researchers' support with an emphasis on young researchers- 2nd Cycle”. The project is co-financed by Greece and the European Union (European Social Fund- ESF) by the Operational Programme Human Resources Development, Education and Lifelong Learning 2014-2020.”</p>

scholarly journals Aura, the city of colour – Australia's shining example of widescale integrated water cycle management

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 737-744 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. McAlister ◽  
M. Stephens ◽  
A. Allen
Keyword(s):  
Water Conservation ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Water Cycle ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Stormwater Treatment ◽  
Sewer System ◽  
Potable Reuse ◽  
Project Sustainability ◽  
The City ◽  
System Designs

Aura, the ‘City of Colour’, is a 48,000 person masterplanned community on Queensland's Sunshine Coast. Aura commenced construction in 2015 and will be developed over the next 25 years. Aura sets a benchmark in Australia regarding large scale urban water sustainability through the application of techniques such as rainwater capture and reuse, construction and operational stormwater treatment, water conservation, advanced sewer system designs and potentially a major stormwater harvesting and indirect potable reuse scheme. This paper outlines the journey taken in seeing Aura advance from ‘concept’ to ‘reality’, describes data collection undertaken and modelling tools applied and outlines activities being implemented at Aura to protect sensitive downstream environments and simultaneously deliver water cycle and project sustainability benefits.

Proposing a typology of nature-based solutions for strengthening resilience of Central Vietnamese cities – First findings from the GreenCityLabHue project

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian Scheuer ◽  
Jessica Jache ◽  
Kora Rösler ◽  
Tran Tuan Anh ◽  
Nguyen Ngoc Tung ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Action Plan ◽  
Urban Expansion ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Urban Ecosystem ◽  
Urban Ecosystem Services ◽  
Societal Challenges ◽  
Central Vietnam ◽  
The City

<p><em>Idea and Objectives:</em> This case study presents first findings of the GreenCityLabHue project. The project aims at implementing an urban learning lab in the city of Hue, Vietnam, for the participatory identification and implementation of innovative nature-based solutions for the protection and improvement of urban ecosystem services and climate change adaptation. We will present urgent environmental and societal challenges for the city of Hue, including the estimated impacts of climate change and resulting disaster risks. Subsequently, we will discuss elements of the green-blue infrastructure to tackle these risks in a sustainable and environmentally just manner in the context of a proposed typology of nature-based solutions. This typology specifically shifts the focus from a European perspective towards nature-based solutions that are locally relevant to strengthen the resilience of Hue and comparable cities in Central Vietnam and/or South-East Asia.</p><p><em>Background:</em> Vietnam is a country that faces multiple challenges. It is a country that experiences rapid urban growth, with an estimated 50% of citizens living in urban areas by 2030 up from 35%, resulting in urban expansion that necessitates safeguarding urban ecosystem services, e.g., for the protection of human health and human well-being. Vietnam is also heavily affected by climate change. Particularly in Central Vietnam, cities face increasing risks of flooding, storms, and temperature extremes.</p><p>By providing multifunctional ecosystem services and diverse benefits, nature-based solutions—and in particular green-blue infrastructure elements—may help to address the aforementioned environmental and societal challenges in a sustainable and integrative manner, e.g., for maintaining air quality, stormwater mitigation, climate regulation, and improving environmental equity.</p><p>Hue is the capital of the Thua Thien-Hue province, located in Central Vietnam on the banks of the Perfume River. It has a population of approximately half a million people, represents a touristic and educational hotspot, and is rated a “top priority city” by the Vietnamese government. In Hue, first steps that consider strengthening the green-blue infrastructure were devised in form of the Hue GrEEEn City Action Plan. However, a more holistic urban planning approach that also addresses challenges related to climate change is still lacking.</p>

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