Climate Adaptation Framework for Advancing Community Stormwater Management.

Area of Science:

• Environmental Engineering
• Urban Planning
• Climate Change Adaptation

Background:

• Urban stormwater runoff poses significant environmental challenges, exacerbated by aging infrastructure and climate change.
• Nature-based Solutions (NbS) offer sustainable stormwater management with societal co-benefits.
• Quantitative assessment of NbS financial trade-offs and optimal configurations is limited.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a framework for optimizing NbS spatial configurations.
• To achieve legislative targets for nitrogen concentration and runoff reduction under future climate change.
• To analyze the financial trade-offs and cost-effectiveness of different NbS schemes.

Main Methods:

• A multiobjective optimization framework was developed.
• Case study conducted in Ningbo, China, considering future climate scenarios.
• Cost-benefit analysis performed over a 15-year period.

Main Results:

• Runoff reduction and nitrogen removal decreased by ~6% across climate scenarios.
• Eight cost-effective NbS schemes were identified through optimization.
• NbS schemes improved runoff reduction (0.86-13.9%) and nitrogen removal (0.08-8.45%) compared to alternatives.
• Low-cost NbS yielded higher benefit-to-cost ratios than high-investment schemes.

Conclusions:

• The developed framework effectively optimizes NbS configurations for climate change adaptation.
• NbS optimization can achieve environmental targets while considering financial viability.
• Tailoring NbS strategies to community income levels and preferences is crucial for maximizing benefits.