Assessing resilience against floods with a system dynamics approach: a comparative study of two models
International Journal of Disaster Resilience in the Built Environment
ISSN: 1759-5908
Article publication date: 23 April 2020
Issue publication date: 7 October 2020
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to present the concepts of two different ways of generating a dynamic structure of the urban system to further allow in understanding specific urban behavior facing against flood and further evaluate the potential effect of specific resilience strategies aiming to decrease the exposure and vulnerability of the system.
Design/methodology/approach
Two system dynamics model structures are presented in form of Casual Loop Diagrams.
Findings
The main differences among the tow approaches are the time horizon and the approach that regulates the assessment of the resilience through a dynamic composite indicator: the first model refers to baseline at initial simulation time; the second model is focused on the ratio service supply to demand.
Research limitations/implications
Within the approach, the purpose is to properly and efficiently evaluate the effect of different Flood Risk Management strategies, i.e. prevention, defence, mitigation, preparation and recovery for consistent and resilient flood governance plans with different type of resilience scenarios.
Originality/value
The need for such tool is underlined by a lack on the assessment of urban resilience to flood as whole, considering the physical and social dimensions and the complex interaction among their main components. There are several assessment tools based on an indicator approach that have been proposed to meet this need. Nevertheless, indicator-based approach has the limitation to exclude the complexity of the system and its systemic interaction in terms of feedbacks’ effects among the identified components or variables selected for the system description. This peculiarity can be provided by System Dynamics modeling.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This work is supported by Capacity Building in Asia for Resilience EducaTion (CABARET) project co-funded by the Erasmus + Programme of the European Union. The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
This work was also partially aided by grant (#108688) from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Ottawa, Canada, for the project Coastal Cities at Risk in the Philippines: Investing in Climate and Resilience. This project is being implemented by the Ateneo de Manila University. The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent those of IDRC or its Board of Governors. The funding source encouraged the submission of the article for publication but had no role in the study design, data collection, data analysis and interpretation, and writing of the article. Support was also provided by the Ateneo Institute of Sustainability (AIS) and the University Research Council (URC).
Citation
Feofilovs, M., Romagnoli, F., Gotangco, C.K., Josol, J.C., Jardeleza, J.M.P., Litam, J.E., Campos, J.I. and Abenojar, K. (2020), "Assessing resilience against floods with a system dynamics approach: a comparative study of two models", International Journal of Disaster Resilience in the Built Environment, Vol. 11 No. 5, pp. 615-629. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJDRBE-02-2020-0013
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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