Accounting for economic factors in socio-hydrology: Optimization under uncertainty and climate change

This paper reframes the socio-hydrology analysis as an optimization problem. To achieve this, we first develop a valuation scheme to estimate net benefits of development in a flood plain, consisting of benefits obtained from land and housing, less the costs of flood management and flood damage. Then we look for an optimal safety factor for the levee heightening strategy within the 'Technosociety' scenario for a given time series of future flood events. This is further extended to finding an optimal strategy in the case of uncertainty concerning flood timings and intensities. We suggest an approach for both stationary and non-stationary evolution of flood dynamics and examine how the levee heightening strategy is affected by the magnitude of climate change. We find that the preferred management option depends strongly on the value of the land services the area provides. © 2019 by the authors.This research is supported by the Basque Government through the BERC 2018-2021 program and by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness MINECO through the BC3 María de Maeztu excellence accreditation MDM-2017-0714. Luis Mª Abadie is grateful for the financial support received from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO RTI2018-093352-B-I00). Marc B. Neumann acknowledges funding (RYC-2013-13628) obtained from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO)