Large-scale water resources management within the framework of GLOWA-Danube - The water supply model

• The research project GLOWA-Danube, financed by the German Federal Government, investigates long-term changes in the water cycle of the upper Danube river basin in light of global climatic change. Its aim is to build a fully integrated decision support tool "DANUBIA" that combines the competence of eleven institutes in domains covering all major aspects governing the water cycle. The research group "Groundwater and Water Supply" at the Institute of Hydraulic Engineering (IWS), Universitaet Stuttgart, contributes a three-dimensional groundwater flow model and a large-scale water supply model which simulate both water availability and quality and water supply and the related costs for global change scenarios. This article addresses the task of creating an agent-based model of the water supply sector. The water supply model links the various physical models determining water quality and availability on the one hand and the socalled "Actor" models calculating water demand on the other by determining the actual water supply and the costs related, which underlie both technical and physical constraints (e.g., existing infrastructure and its capacity, water availability and quality, geology, elevation, etc.). In reality, water supply within the study is organised through a three-tiered structure: long-distance, regional, and a multitude of community-based suppliers. In order to model this system in which each supply company defines its own optimum, an agent-based modelling approach (implemented using JAVA) was chosen. This approach is novel to modelling water supply in that not only water supply infrastructure but more importantly the decision makers (communities, water supply companies) are represented as generalised objects, capable of performing actions following rules that are determined by the class they belong to. © 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Ämnesord

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Geovetenskap och miljövetenskap -- Oceanografi, hydrologi och vattenresurser (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Earth and Related Environmental Sciences -- Oceanography, Hydrology and Water Resources (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Agent-based modelling

Decision support system

Stakeholder involvement

Sustainable water supply

Water supply model

Computer simulation

Decision support systems

Management

Mathematical models

Sustainable development

Water quality

Water supply

Agent based modelling

Groundwater resources

water management

water resource

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