Balancing clean Water and Energy provision under changing climate and eXtremes

Introduction

Providing clean water and energy simultaneously to a growing global population and under a changing climate is a major challenge. The demand for the two and their systemic interdependencies are particularly strong during droughts and heatwaves. Despite the recent growth in water-energy nexus studies, there is little fundamental understanding of the cascading effects and feedbacks between water and energy systems during extreme weather events.

Challenges in Current Models

Because existing global model approaches mainly focus on whole-system optimisation and are based on coarse spatiotemporal water and energy system representations, we lack understanding of how water-energy system processes cascade in time and space under a changing climate and extremes. Yet such understanding is urgently needed so that we can balance clean water and energy provision in our changing world in which climate shocks are increasing.

Project Overview

In B-WEX, I will develop spatially explicit pathways that reveal how the provision of clean water and energy can be balanced under various water management and energy transition developments. This includes the feedbacks and cascading mechanisms under present to future droughts and heatwaves in regions worldwide.

Framework Development

With my team, I will build a novel global framework which will be the first to integrate high spatiotemporal resolution models of:

1. Hydrology
2. Water quality
3. Water use
4. Energy systems

This framework will estimate how water and energy system processes cascade in time and space.

Collaboration and Pathway Development

Together with key actors, we will also develop quantitative water management and energy transition (climate action) pathways. We will then combine these pathways with our new framework, enabling us to estimate trade-offs between water and energy systems during present to future droughts and heatwaves.

Conclusion

The B-WEX project will greatly deepen our understanding of the cascading effects and feedbacks between clean water and energy systems development that occur under changing climate and extremes, including climate mitigation actions.