A decision support system framework for strategic water resources planning and management under projected climate scenarios for a reservoir complex

• Published in: Journal of hydrology (Amsterdam) 2021-12, Vol.603, p.127051, Article 127051
• Main Authors: Jaiswal, Rahul Kumar, Lohani, Anil Kumar, Tiwari, Hari Lal
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Analytical hierarchal process; Climate change; Decision support system; Robust decision making; Scenarios analysis; Statistical downscaling; Water resource management
• ISSN: 0022-1694; 1879-2707
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2021.127051

•Developed a Decision Support Framework to classify uncertainties and management options using participatory scoping for scenarios analysis.•DSS includes: reservoirs water balance, statistical downscaling, hydrological modelling, sediment assessment, water management and decision support for water management plans.•DSS framework was applied to Tandula reservoir Complex, India and performance was evaluated using multi-criteria decision support in the three-layer hierarchal process.•DSS framework provides a solution for strategic water resources planning and management in a basin using the participation of farmers, technocrats, and water resource managers. The climate uncertainties, data scarcity, and socio-techno challenges pose significant threats and options respectively to the future planning of complex water projects in developing countries. This paper attempts to develop a decision support system (DSS) framework to classify uncertainties and management options using participatory scoping for scenarios analysis with the aid of six interrelated modules namely (i) water balance of reservoirs for computation of runoff (ii) statistical downscaling for climate projection (iii) hydrological modelling (iv) sediment assessment (v) water management and (vi) decision support for the assessment of the performance of multiple management plans designed for three future assessment periods of 2020-35, 2046-64 and 2081-99. The proposed framework was applied to the Tandula complex system of Chhattisgarh state of India consists of three reservoirs namely Tandula, Kharkhara, and Gondli having water transfer in their commands and for industrial use. The developed DSS framework provides the opportunity to analyze the management plans with climate uncertainties for the complex water resources projects having data scarcity. Here, in the present paper, the developed DSS framework incorporates eighty-four diverse management plans devised from constant interaction with stakeholders and technocrats resulting to deal with climate uncertainties using possible improvement in efficiencies and consumptive use for three future assessment periods. Furthermore, the performance of the developed plans was evaluated using multi-criteria decision support in the three-layer hierarchal process. The decision support analysis suggested that the second assessment period (FP-2: 2046-64) will be more crucial from the management point of view where 54 out of 81 plans could not perform as par with th